Michel, lives happily with Marie-Claire, his wife of nearly 30 years. A dedicated shop steward for CGT, he is charged with calling out the names in a draw in the shipyard to select who will be the 20 workers which it has been agreed will be made redundant. Though he did not need to place his own name in the draw, he did so and it is drawn, and so he becomes one of the two losing their jobs. His fellow workers and his family organize a party for his 30th wedding anniversary and present he and his wife with travel money and a ticket to Tanzania so they can climb Mount Kilimanjaro, singing the 1960s hit song "Kilimandjaro". Raoul, Michel's brother-in-law, workmate and fellow trade union official presents him with a treasured but long-lost comic book from Michel's childhood, which Raoul says he found in a secondhand bookshop. Before they leave for their holiday, Michel and Marie-Claire are playing cardsat home with Raoul and Raoul's wife, Denise and are brutally robbed by two men of the comic book and other possessions. Michel is injured while Denise becomes seriously disturbed from the trauma. One of the robbers On a bus, Michel sees two children reading the stolen comic book. Following them, he recognises their older brother Christophe as one of his fellow redundant workers. He identifies Christophe to the police and watches his arrest. Gradually, Michel and Marie-Claire discover that Christophe is caring for his two younger brothers, neglected for years by their mother. Michel has second thoughts and wants to withdraw his accusation, but the case cannot be withdrawn. In the spirit of his hero, the French socialist leader Jean Jaurès, he decides to try to help the two younger brothers, only to discover that Marie-Claire has beaten him to it and is already secretly taking care of the children. They realise that it is their shared ideals that cement their relationship and, after arguments with their own, grown-up, children and with Raoul, they take the two boys into their home to look after them while their brother serves a long sentence. Raoul admits that he didn't find the comic book in a secondhand bookshop at all, but had stolen it from Michel when they were children.
The story, written by director Robert Guédiguian and Jean-Louis Milesi, takes its inspiration from the poem Les pauvres gensone of the best known of Victor Hugo's poems from his three-volume poetry collection, La Légende des siècles. The title, on the other hand, is taken from the name of the song the main characters' family sings in the film: Pascal Danel's song "Kilimandjaro", known in French as Les Neiges du Kilimandjaro.
