Jeanne, a young agricultural engineer, decides to take over from her grandfather Jean-Baptiste. The old peasant is worried whether there is any future in it. The "champ dolent" - or "mournful field" - is a meadow dominated by an upright stone which gives the place its beauty and mystery. This is where Jean-Baptiste, its owner, comes to be alone when things aren't right on the land. He loses himself in his memories, imagines the past, and finds the strength and the reasons to brave current hardships. The old days were not all good. Two stories interweave over the course of the four episodes. The first, set in the present: Jean-Baptiste's life. The countryside of the past thirty years. The second, set in the recent past: the revolution of the 1950s. The death of the peasant, and the birth of the farmer. Before that, the interwar years. The slow change in mentalities. The family secrets. The apparent harmony between the generations. 1914-18. The men and the draft animals go away to war while three million peasant women stay home to sweat and toil on the land..
