Mort d'un pourri (1977)

In the middle of the night, deputy Philippe Dubaye wakes up his old friend Xavier Maréchal with disturbing news: he has just killed Serrano, a racketeer with extant political connections. ... See full summary »

Director:

Georges Lautner

Writers:

Jean Laborde (novel), Michel Audiard (dialogue)

Stars:

Alain Delon, Ornella Muti, Stéphane Audran

2 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Alain Delon	...	Xavier 'Xav' Maréchal
Ornella Muti	...	Valérie
Stéphane Audran	...	Christiane
Mireille Darc	...	Françoise
Maurice Ronet	...	Philippe Dubaye
Michel Aumont	...	Commissaire Moreau
Jean Bouise	...	Commissaire Pernais
Daniel Ceccaldi	...	Lucien Lacor
Julien Guiomar	...	Fondari
Klaus Kinski	...	Nicolas Tomski
François Chaumette	...	Lansac
Xavier Depraz	...	Marcel
Henri Virlojeux	...	Paul
Colette Duval	...	La secrétaire de Serrano
Carole Lange	...	La fille du vestiaire

Storyline

In the middle of the night, deputy Philippe Dubaye wakes up his old friend Xavier Maréchal with disturbing news: he has just killed Serrano, a racketeer with extant political connections. Serrano kept proofs of Dubaye's involvement in corrupt dealings and was poised to use them against the deputy. Xavier readily agrees to cover up for his old pal Philippe, but he soon runs into difficulties. Nobody believes Dubaye's alibi. And everybody -- influential personalities, powerful businessmen, dubious go-betweens and the police -- wants to get hold of the documents that served to blackmail Dubaye; by all possible means...

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Plot Keywords:

corruption | based on novel

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Details

Country:

France

Language:

French

Release Date:

7 December 1977 (France)

Also Known As:

The Twisted Detective

Company Credits

Production Co:

Adel Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

120 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Eastmancolor)

Did You Know?

Trivia

Due to his wild reputation of being particularly difficult, the casting of Klaus Kinski on this film caused some serious apprehension to director Georges Lautner, who eventually found in him the nicest and most cooperative actor he could have dreamed of.

User Reviews

Corrupt officials are after a revealing diary in Alain Delon's possession

With Stan Getz supplying the private eye type of music, all that this story needed was some voice over narration to parallel a Sinatra cover of a Mitchum detective movie. In this French version, Delon's political friend Philippe comes to him with the news that he has killed a corrupt official, Serrano, and obtained his explosive diary of payoffs and deals of politicians and businessmen. Delon supplies Philippe with an alibi, gets the diary and hides it, but them Philippe is murdered. This sets Delon on a path of finding out who did it.

Delon holds the high cards but he's relentlessly pressured on both sides, by the police and by those acting for the puppet masters, one of whom is Klaus Kinski. Philippe's lover helps him out. Philippe's wife (Stephane Audran), who also was having an affair bobs in and out, playing for acquisition of the diary. There are some neat car chases with those always nifty looking European models. There are some heavies on the prowl, not afraid to leave a corpse or two behind.

Delon plays it cool, in the Sinatra-Mitchum vein. He produced this, and he was in good form. The movie moves along smoothly, is well-staged, and provides moments of good suspense. The mystery of who killed Philippe is not telegraphed. We get our money's worth, in this noirish thriller from 1977 that falls between outright noir and the rougher neo-noirs to follow, but is closer to Philip Marlowe or the heroic detective than it is to the thematically darker neo-noirs, but this does employ the corruption theme that became a staple of such fare.

The French versions are fully competitive with the American, and it's nice to see them. My version had Greek subtitles, to which I added English sub-titles. Fortunately, they appeared between the lines and with some concentration, I got the dialog. Next time, I can concentrate more on the movie itself.

The only thing preventing a higher score I'd say is that the story elements seem familiar and the nature of the conspiracies were on the vague side.