Benedito Dias Rodrigues The opportunity to see Romy Schneider naked in the grass already justifies itself to watch this movie directed by Claude Chabrol,I never liked those European movies called Nouvelle Vague...whose the director came from...but this kind of suspense is amazing a true Hitchcock's movie....the plot is usual the pretty young woman married with a rich old man finds a lover,the result is predicable....but Chabrol provides some surprises along the story...the cast is fine as Rod Steiger and Jean Rochefort,but no one exceed Romy she is sexy than never and desirable....valuable movie settled in Saint Tropez.

dbdumonteil "Les Innocents" was released at a time when Chabrol's career was slowly but inexorably slipping..Among a handful of horrors ("nada" "Les Magiciens" and the nadir "Folies Bourgeoises" ),before Chabrol regained his mastery with his underrated "Alice Ou La Dernière Fugue" or "Violette Nozières" ,but only for a while.Except for the 1968-1971 period or his debut,Chabrol's career has been erratic ,mainly because he has made too many films ."Les Innocents" inaugurated a new genre for Chabrol,which actually began with "Docteur Popaul": a tongue-in-cheek thriller ,it paved a reliable way for such works as "Inspecteur Lavardin" "Masques" "Poulet Au Vinaigre" or "Rien Ne Va Plus" .None of these works were major works but some of them (particularly "Masques" ) are pleasant enough.A foreign viewer may take this story seriously ,compare it with Bresson (!) but a French one cannot be fooled.Chabrol actually laughs at the audience as he laughs at Julie: although a criminal,Julie almost appears as a victim....of men of course as Lawyer Mr Legal (what a name!) says .We come to pity Julie (the scene in the bank where she learns that all the money she has left is 92 francs is priceless)and her character sometimes resembles that of Stephane Audran in "la Rupture " ,this great 1970 work.With its spate of "unexpected " twists ,"Les Innocents " may seem today ahead of its time.But not only "Alice ou La Derniere Fugue " which had only one (unexpected twist) packed a real wallop -in the grand tradition of "carnival of souls" "Jacob's ladder" and "the sixth sense"-,those of "the innocents do not make sense cause the characters are uninteresting (Do you care for them as you did for the characters of ,say,"le Boucher" or "Que La Bête Meure" ?)and RomySchneider ,one of my favorite actresses ,does not belong in Chabrol's world.Neither does Rod Steiger.Only Mischievous Jean Rochefort and the pair of Colomboesque cops (Pierre Santini and François Maistre who play cat and mouse with Julie)really survive in this hotchpotch.

The_Void Innocents with Dirty Hands appears to have something of a poor reputation among it's viewers and that made me go into it expecting something a bit sub-par from the great French director, so you can imagine my delight when I found that there's very little wrong with this twisted thriller and while it's not quite up there with the best of Claude Chabrol (films such as This Man Must Die, The Butcher and The Breach); it's a thriller that keeps the viewer on the edge of their seat for the duration of the film and provides plenty of shocks and twists along the way! The film is unlike some of Chabrol's other films in that the plot is rather simple and the film focuses on a couple with the surname Wormser. Louis Wormser is 18 years senior to his wife Julie and can no longer have sex after suffering a heart attack. When Julie meets young stud Jeff Marle, the two plot to kill Louis and hatch a plan to dispatch him and deflect suspicion from themselves. However, things go awry immediately after the murder when Julie finds herself alone and under suspicion.The main influence for this film would seem to be The Postman Always Rings Twice as the two plots share a lot in common. Innocents with Dirty Hands does get criticised for being a bit too long, and this is a bit of a problem. The story has plenty to it and is constantly interesting thanks to the numerous twists in the second half; but it could have benefited from being a bit more streamline as the way it pans out does remove some of the suspense. However, this is hardly enough to condemn the film. The first hour building up the initial twist is absolutely superb and Chabrol keeps the tension bubbling nicely. After the initial twist, the film changes somewhat and the focus is more on surprising the audience, but despite this change in pace; the film still flows well. The film is bolstered by two excellent performances from the leads; the beautiful Romy Schneider is superb as the young wife while Rod Steiger is thoroughly convincing in the opposite role. The film works on a number of levels; it's entertaining, thrilling and also funny in places and while it's filmed with Chabrol's familiar verve and focuses on the marital relationship - it's also a change of pace for him. Overall, this is well worth seeing and I'm sure that anyone who enjoys Chabrol's films will find a lot to like in this one.

MartinHafer First, as another reviewer pointed out, the two leads (Romy Schneider and Rod Steiger) do their parts in English and the rest of the cast are speaking French--making it irrelevant whether or not you watch the French-dubbed or English-dubbed version. However, and this is odd, you probably should NOT watch the film with captioning, as the subtitles are inferior to both dubbed versions! I know this makes no sense, but often the subtitles were inaccurate or didn't convey the message as well as the actors originally spoke! I actually watched about half the film in French and then watched the other half in English. But boy were those subtitles annoying--even getting little details wrong.As for the film itself, through the first half of the film, it all seems pretty familiar--especially for a tale directed by Claude Chabrol. He made a career out of films about infidelity and murder. However, midway through the film, the film has many excellent twists and turns. BUT I CANNOT REALLY TALK ABOUT THEM WITHOUT WRITING A FEW SPOILERS, SO BE ADVISED!!! Romy and boy-toy, Jeff, begin a torrid affair as the husband (Steiger) drinks himself to oblivion. Eventually, the lovers come up with a plan to murder Steiger and live off his fortune. Unfortunately for the lovers, the plan goes awry but it isn't certain exactly what happened--all we know is Romy is now being blamed for possibly killing BOTH men, as there isn't much trace of them.When Steiger returns later and is indeed alive, this created a wonderful opportunity for the film, as Romy suddenly found that her formerly impotent husband is very potent indeed and their dead relationship is rejuvenated. This would have been a wonderful point to end the story. In essence, the woman's lover is killed by the impotent man, who, in doing this regains his own power and sexuality--a somewhat kinky but fascinating idea. Unfortunately, while this was where the film was going, the movie had an additional 30 minutes of plot twists that did a lot to confuse everything and make the story much more difficult to believe. It's a great example of a film that didn't know when to stop. Without the next 30 minutes, I'd have scored the movie an 8. With it, the impact is greatly lessened. I strongly agree with the review that saw this film as needlessly complicated--a problem common to many of Chabrol's films.Finally, a note to parents that this isn't a great film for kids due to its sexual nature and nudity. Miss Schneider, at age 37, is quite lovely in her many nude scenes--it's a real shame her life off-screen was so short and tragic.