Le corps de mon ennemi

Over a period of twenty-five years the partnership of Henri Verneuil and Jean-Paul Belmondo produced seven films of varying quality. This neo-noir is their penultimate and although their most ambitious is arguably one of the least effective and definitely the least commercially successful.

M. Belmondo was understandably one of his country's most popular actors but this depended very much on the type of film. Throughout the 1970's his fans expected oodles of action and well choreographed stunts but this would not have been their tasse de thé at all. When the dialogue credit belongs to Michel Audiard one can be sure the characters will have plenty to say but for what is essentially a revenge thriller the piece is long on talk and short on suspense. There is a lack of momentum and despite clever editing by Pierre Gillette the constant flashbacks disrupt the flow which will aggravate those who prefer a narrative to be linear. On the plus side it is gorgeous to look at courtesy of production design by Francois de Lamothe and cinematography by Jean Penzer. Those who lean to the Left will no doubt enjoy the digs at the 'haut de société'.

Heading the cast is the always-good-value Bernard Blier who enjoyed a nigh on sixty-year career and who again excels here as a morally ambiguous character. On the distaff side it is always a delight to see the classy Marie-France Pisier, the thinking man's crumpet, wherever she turns up and nice to see veteran Suzy Prim in her final film appearance. Belmondo, suffice to say, has star quality in spades and although he knocks a few people about, only those who deserve it, naturally, his character here is more brain than brawn. He ends up getting the girl of course who's young enough to be his daughter.

Verneuil remained an excellent film maker in the technical sense but despite his later films being better dressed, there is, for this viewer at any rate, something missing.

That reminds me, I really must watch his 'Mélodie En Sous-Sol' again.