While the Italian films had a barely contained seat-of -your-pants kind of manic energy to them, the French genre films tend to me more restrained, brooding and deliberate.Īnother French crime film available on kanopy is Touchez pas au Grisbi (Hands off the Loot!) with the great Jean Gabin at his world weary best and young up and comers Lino Ventura and Jeanne Moreau. Less is more for Melville’s mostly doomed leading men. And it’s got cool as ice, hard as nails Alain Delon in the iconic role as a hitman with the very un-Gallic name Jef (with one F!) Costello. It’s in colour if – for reasons which I am surely unable to fully comprehend – you don’t like black and white. From this group, I’d start with 1967’s Le Samourai. Some of Melville’s films on Kanopy are Le Doulos, Le Samourai, Bob le Flambeur, Un Flic. Melville man Lino Ventura telling it like it is. I stare in wonderment while his characters deliver their lines with a cigarette continually hanging out of the corner of their mouth while successfully avoiding getting smoke in their eyes. ) but paired it with a slower pace, lingering takes and sparse dialogue. Inspired by American gangster films of the 30s and 40s he applied the look and feel of those films ( think tough guys in trench coats and fedoras and lots of smoking. He kept the name as he went into the film industry after the war. One of my all time favourites, he was born Jean Pierre Grumbach but he took the last name Melville (after his favourite American author) when he joined the French resistance in WWII. Many of them received the high brow treatment and are in fact available through the Criterion Collection and of course through Kanopy.Īny conversation of French crime films during the 20th century should really start with the king: Jean Pierre Melville. Well, it’s quite the opposite with the French movies.
In that last entry I wrote about how none of the movies being discussed will ever be candidates for a Criterion release. Starting with France which is the headliner here. As mentioned, I’ll stick with older films in the crime genre but this time I’ll look at how they do it around the globe.
(Although I remain very much unconvinced a fedora has any place in 21st century fashion)Ī few weeks ago I took a look at Italian crime films from the 1970’s available on Kanopy. The era before most urban landscapes became dominated by a glut of global franchises creating a look of sameness.Īnd just maybe since I haven’t worn anything that includes a collar for over 6 weeks I enjoy a little nattiness on the screen – because I sure don’t see it when I look in the mirror these days. One thing that draws me to of the films I’m going to look at is that being from the 1950s – 1970s they give me a chance to see the character of cities like Paris and London as they used to be. No doubt about it, times are hard right now so maybe it’s the relief that comes after watching the action and telling yourself “Well…at least I’m having a better day than those guys there.” Sure you have spent 23 of the last 24 hours inside but you’re still probably thankful that it’s not you who is on the lam (unless it’s the ever-cool Jean-Paul Belmondo and Jean Seberg in Breathless in which case maybe you wouldn’t mind being them…just for a bit.) Why are people drawn to crime films? Maybe similar to horror films, there is some degree of escapism, but also catharsis and perhaps curiosity about how (or if) it will all be resolved by the time the end credits roll. Always popular, they keep coming to the screen year after year. I gravitate towards crime movies in all their varieties: the heist film, the gangster film, prison break film, police procedural and so on. The biggest genre out there may be the one that I’ll refer to broadly as crime films.
Okay, I’ll stop before I get arrested for torturing the metaphor any further. And best of all? No one has to split up the riches! (If I’ve learned anything after watching a lot of crime films I’ve come to appreciate that the divvying up of spoils is so often where things go very wrong) But it’s a different outcome for the audience – they make their getaway from the experience all the richer with a metaphorical loot-bag of rewards for their eyes, ears and mind – not a bad haul for their viewing efforts. In the movies, crime might not pay quite the opposite generally.
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