Originally conceived for the French-German television network Arte as a four-part serial and featuring local actors from Northern France, P'tit Quinquin is an aburdist, slapstick, metaphysical and at times disturbing murder mystery. The film opens with the discovery of human remains stuffed inside a dead cow in a World War II German bunker by the beach. Capitaine Van der Weyden investigates this crime as well as subsequent, no less bizarre ones, but he has to contend with a band of young scoundrels led by P'tit Quinquin, a boy who always goes around with his beloved Eve.