writers_reign
This was number 84 out of the 95 films that Jean Gabin appeared in over his long career. He still had both The Sicilian Clan and Le Chat ahead of him, with Le Chat being superior to both this entry and The Sicilian Clan but nevertheless this is a half-decent heist movie which has Gabin's flic, Inspector Joss, out to avenge a colleague whom, it turns out, was on the pad anyway. There's a nice line in ruthless heavies in the quaintly named Quinquin (pronounced Can Can) and a couple of good set-piece heists which crank up the interest and though it lacks both the Class and Style of Gabin's come-back movie Touchez-pas au grisbi it's far from chopped liver.
vostf
Except from the opening prologue at the graveyard, Le Pacha starts as a fine crime movie. The robbery is great, and another high point is the scene where Nathalie (Dany Carrel) meets Quinquin (André Pousse) at the 'JNS 3' shop. Then the movie stops being interesting, the whole plot is just let go to reach the agreed upon conclusion. Either they felt too tired after writing the first part or they had to compromise henceforth.Gabin benefits from Audiard's dialog, but he is definitely not the main asset hereI agree with a previous reviewer that Gabin does bog down the global rhythm, he just hams it as he did most of the time in the later decade of his career, playing the tough intractable patriarch. This really makes a boring character that prevents the script from being more clever. Gabin actually demanded that the script be tailored to suit his own image of The Patriarch of French Cinema, and it painfully shows here in contrast with such an interesting, if very violent, first half. Just remember that Gabin had declined to play the lead in Les Tontons Flingueurs, otherwise we would not have had that masterpiece of French comedy.SPOILERS thereafter: the 65min markIMO Le Pacha goes down the drain when Nathalie goes to meet Quinquin at his house. OK she wanted a personal revenge, but she was an interesting character who was cheaply gotten rid of for the sake of a script that is then just dull till the end. Now I understand Gabin would have been reluctant to share more screen time with her, but I really feel the key to a better final act lies with a more clever part for Dany Carrel. It's all too obvious since the movie is just 80min long and we've got this rushed, linear, uninteresting telegraphed ending after the 65min mark. The movie could have been 10min longer and way better... were it not for Mr Gabin almighty star power.
maxn
While the story is pretty run-of-the-mill detective stuff, there are some bits of cinematography that I found stunning: Léon's car sinking in the pond while Brigitte Bardot sings "Harley Davidson", the odd meeting between Quinquin and Nathalie in the very cool JNS3 shop, Quinquin's elimination of his co-conspirators at the farm, the details of the original heist that starts everything off. The police offices are surreally cool and modern, stuffed with (for the time) ultra-high technology.It's really not Gabin's best performance by a long shot; another reviewer amusingly mentions him "waddling in." He seems tired and like he's just phoning it in. I disagreed that Dany Carrel couldn't act; I thought she was pretty good (and really beautiful). André Pousse (Quinquin) was very effective as a ruthless murderer.It was fun to see Gainsbourg and his nicotine-stained fingers in the studio. The music was used to pretty good effect through the movie -- perhaps most strikingly, as I noted above, when Quinquin takes care of Léon at the pond. Two touches that amused me: Gabin's character was named Joss, which presages Joss Beaumont in Le Professional (1981), another Lautner/Audiard collaboration. More subtle: the railway station chief at Troyes speaks with a pronounced stutter; Troyes is best known for the coronation of Louis the Stammerer in 878.I also got a kick out of it since it was filmed the year I was born, and the world then looks so different from the way it does now.
Laurent Mousson
Well, it may possibly not have aged that well, notably the story line, that's pretty linear, but this film nevertheless has a few decent assets.First, the cast, granted you get Gabin playing lead, or rather freewheeling lead, but look at the rest of the cast : an impressive array of distinctive supporting actors, many of which can be spotted in many other films of the day, who do a spendid job in here, even when silent. For example, André Pousse has the perfect face for the ruthless gangster job he does in the movie.Second asset is the mood, a sort of sticky, foggy, terribly square version of the late sixties. The final scene in a rundown factory is truly awesome. This atmosphere is enhanced by Serge Gainsbourg's splendidly sober score (Gainsbourg himself appears in one scene, singing the striking "Requiem pour un con"), based on mesmerising percussion loops (way ahead of its time) or very gentle hammond organ parts. Oh and one song by Brigitte Bardot ("Harley Davidson") is also featured as background to one scene.Third, which can only be fully appreciated with a good command of French, is the script and dialogue, where Michel Audiard delivers some of his hilarious trademark one-liners, such as "le jour où on mettra les cons sur orbite, ben t'as pas fini de tourner" ["the day they'll put gits on orbit, you'll be far from stopping to revolve"], which rely on slang and adequate delivery to give an unmistakable texture to the lines.The only real downers here are the embarrassingly "hip" nightclub scenes, complete with sitar-laden raga-rock, that are pretty unwatchable to today's standards.Last point : it's pretty violent for its time, but in an almost choreographed way, which could in a way evoke "Spaghetti" Westerns or Sam Peckinpah's work...An enjoyable slice of 1960s french cinema, simply does the job.
AD
