Rififi (Du Rififi chez les hommes, 1955)

Swedish Studio S Entertainment edition

Text below written 2018-12-10


For some reason i haven't seen this famous French crime movie until now, in december 2018, not on DVD, in the cinemas or on TV,
and now when i've seen it i can only say this - wow! The DVD cover blurts out - "undoubtedly the best crime movie in film history"
and even though this statement may be a bit drastic, it could well be the truth. Rififi really is that good.

The famous Heist scene has influenced countless of crime movies over the years and the novel & film has even given it's name to
a certain kind of burglary method - a Rififi coup when you enter a bank, store or whatever through a hole in the wall, roof or floor.
The Heist scene in this film goes on for some 30 minutes and with the thieves being silent, and with .... close-ups of their sweaty
foreheads .... will the alarm go off ? Will a nosy Night watchman turn up? A Heist and sweaty foreheads .... a staple of the genre.
How to do a Rififi coup ? Well, you can drill, weld or blast your way into a bank vault i guess and you will have to find a way to
silence the alarm too. Which cable to cut, the red or the blue one ? Close-up of a sweaty forehead and suspense in the cinema.

Tony (Jean Servais) is out again after a 5 year stint in jail and his ex-girlfriend has dumped him for another gangster, the nightclub
owner Grutter (Pierre Grasset). Together with his buddies Jo (Carl Möhner), italian Mario (Robert Manuel) and another italian guy,
the expert safe-cracker Césare (played by Jules Dassin himself) he performs the perfect coup and steals 240 million francs.

A Newspaper vendor screams: "The Neatest coup since the abduction of the Sabine women" (aah, yes, i love roman mythology)

Everything's Daisy then? No, Grutter and his cronies, including junkie Rémi (played by talented director and actor Robert Hossein)
suspects that Tony is the Master behind the crime, and they want to grab the money. A gangster war is a coming.

Jules Dassin was blacklisted in the US McCarthy hysteria and had to move to Europe. He re-wrote the script and made this film on
a very low budget (200 000 USD) and he won Best Director prize at Cannes 1955. The film became a world wide Hit and a Classic.
The film is presented in original 4:3 ratio, black & white, with a french 2.0 stereo audio and swedish subtitles.
Extras: a photo gallery, english trailer, trivia, biographies, trailers for other films

 

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