French actor Alain Delon died a few months back, and I don't think that TCM had a traditional programming tribute to him. One of his movies is on my DVR and on TCM soon, so I decided to watch it: Le Samouraï, tomorrow (October 17) at 6:00 AM.
Delon plays Jef [sic] Costello, and as the movie opens he's in one of those crappy apartments in Paris of a sort similar to those that seemed to populate American noir movies as well as a lot of European films where the housing stock was older and much worse, living there with just a bird for a pet. He exits the apartment and gets into a Citroën parked along the street, where he pulls out a ring of keys and tests each of them in the ignition. He finally finds one that starts the car, stealing it and taking it to a place that changes the license plate for him. Jef then goes to the apartment of his girlfriend Jane (Delon's then wife Nathalie), asking her to come up with an airtight alibi for him. After this, he goes to a nightclub called Martey's, goes to the office to see Martey, and shoots Martey dead!
However, quite a few people saw Jef as he entered and exited the club. Worse, Jef is stupid enough that he always wears the same hat, which seems like it would be a pretty big giveaway to the police. They, in the form of the Commissar (François Périer), investigate the case, rounding up the usual suspects. Unsurprisingly, Jef is one of those suspects, since he's been well known to the police for ages. A lot of what follows over the remainder of the movie is not quite a police procedural, but a decided cat-and-mouse game as the police, suspecting Jef, try to tail him. Jef, for his part, tries to give the police the slip as much as possible.
Jef also has good reason for that. He hasn't been paid off for his side of the contract killing yet. He goes to what in America would be an el train overpass to meet Olivier, the man responsible for fulfilling the contract from that end and paying Jef. Instead of a cash payoff, however, Olivier tries to kill Jef, only giving Jef a wound in the left forearm. At least some people however, will have noticed that Jef has been shot and doesn't have full use of his left arm any more.
Meanwhile, the club's pianist (Caty Rosier) saw Jef enter and leave Martey's, so was naturally called in by the police. Surprisingly, however, she lies about Jef's identity. Jef starts to put two and two together, realizing that she knows something about who the people above Olivier responsible for hiring him are. They want him dead, figuring that if the police do get him he might be able to tell the police something about who the people behind Jef are. Best to get Jef out of the way for good.
Now, this synopsis probably makes Le Samouraï sound like a dry film. But it's actually quite good. There's violence and some action, although the pace is not exactly fast. That, however, works in favor of a movie like this, building up the tension. It also felt to me like there was rather less dialog, again, something that's to the movie's benefit.
Le Samouraï feels like it could fit in well with American noir films, only with a certain French flair of its own, making it the sort of foreign-language film easier for those who aren't particularly into reading subtitles -- and definitely not wanting to deal with arthouse stuff -- to sink their teeth into. If you haven't seen it before, don't miss this TCM airing.
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