Lucky Jo

Michel Deville had begun his career with an average thriller:"Une Balle Dans Le Canon" featuring ,among others ,Brigitte Bardot's sister Mijanou."Lucky Jo" was a return to the genre,but with much better results.The cast was very good (Eddie Constantine-generally relegated to mediocre B-movies- Georges Wilson,Françoise Arnoul,and the Brasseurs ,father and son),there was a nice score by Delerue and a good use of the wide screen.

Although marred by two or three rumbles ,the screenplay is certainly smarter than most French films noirs of the time.In fact,one thinks of Jean Pierre Melville,without all his metaphysical pretensions and all the numerous tedious parts which the "Cercle Rouge" director used to bestow on his ecstatic audience .

In "Lucky Jo" the characters hardly meet,except for the prologue when all their (illegal) attempts are failure .The villains work behind the scenes and the hero is alone most of the time ,or almost alone (since a dog becomes his mate).The Police seem to play a strange chess game ,and it is a joy to see Pierre and Claude Brasseur playing in the same film :to my knowledge,it is the only film when they portray the father and the son.

There are fine lines (written by Deville himself and his faithful Nina Companeez )sometimes influenced by Prevert:"I call a taxi and I call myself Jo".

It seems most difficult to marry comedy and crime. This is another example. Great cast, nice jokes, suspense.

The intense Nina Companeez, famous later for her "Dames de la cote", failed here. (She credited as primary dialogue writers) The depths that such an undertaking requires wasn't met, however.

Superficiality poses no problem in comedy. But it tends to kill crime. And here, despite of an amazing and promising story, diving into the criminal element wasn't done in sufficient depth. On the other hand, all possible comedial possibilities were exhausted. At times detrimental to the crime part.

Therefore we end up with yet another past-time worthwhile watching; and at the same time deploring the missed opportunities.

To name just one single example: When father commissionaire asks for the photo of Jo, his son says it is missing in the files. Father then gives him two minutes to get it, if not he'll direct traffic in Martinique (so to say). He then rams his head at the closed door, falls to the ground. In that moment an agent enters, Jo's photo in his hand, 'it was at the printers'. If this is what we wanted to see, we'd be watching Laurel and Hardy.

Eddie Constantine was a phenomenon, of Russian ancestry, a singer educated in Vienna, American citizen but better at French than English, making his career in Paris, first as a singer, then as perhaps the most hard-boiled noir actor of all. This film is more positively entertaining than noir, there are some hilarious fighting scenes, in the last one an entire restaurant is demolished by obstinate hoodlums knocking Eddie about but getting more knocked out themselves, and the story is actually ingenious. It starts with four gangsters doing a series of robberies that fail, one after the other, always followed by three of them waiting for the fourth to come out of jail, to then start all over again, organizing the next job. The last time Eddie comes ut, there is no one to meet him, and he learns, that the others have tired of, what they term, the bad luck he brings. Instead there are other gangsters doing jobs in this way, and he finds himself collecting their bodies. Several dames are involved, it seems to get really serious, but Pierre Brasseur as the police inspector knows and understands his Eddie. It is a very interesting and underrated film, and Eddie Constantine is one of those actors whose mere name in the cast ensures a film worth watching.

Lucky Jo is directed by Michel Deville and adapted to screenplay by Nina Companeez and Michel Deville from the novel "Main pleine" written by Pierre-Vial Lesou. It stars Eddie Constantine, Pierre Brasseur, Georges Wilson, Christiane Minazzoli, Jean-Pierre Darras, Françoise Arnoul and André Cellier. Music is by Georges Delerue and cinematography by Claude Lecomte.

Lucky Jo (Constantine) and his three friends are petty criminals who try to get by from small burglaries. But they never seem to have any luck, with the source of misfortune usually accountable to Jo. While Jo is in prison once again, they decide they'd better do without him in future, but he decides to help them from afar - with less than successful results - again!

As most serious film noir lovers will tell you, the French continued making film noir movies throughout the 1960s - with outstanding rewards. What is evident here with Lucky Jo, is that a French production also managed to achieve that rare old skill of making a crime/noir/comedy that works.

To emphasise the comedy aspects is kind of under selling the pic, for it has great drama, action, tragedy and fulsome characterisations. You may find upon viewing this one that you be laughing uneasily for darkness is never too far away. The initial capers at pic's start have a splendid hapless whiff to them, but once the trajectory of Jo's bad luck starts to take shape, the narrative ups the ante for dramatic purpose with that devilish noir trait of coincidence biting hard.

Sure enough, our main protagonist ends up in all sorts of trouble, hunted for ghastly crimes purely because noir has dealt its crafty hand. Cue great punch ups, cool moments as Jo (Constantine is great) goes about trying to prove his innocence, even gathering a smart and loyal canine partner (hello "High Sierra") in the process. Hell, he even has time to rescue a bar dwelling dame (Anouk Ferjac) from drunken male suitors.

There's a clinical turn of events that belies the comedic strands that drift in and out, and it's here where the Jo character comes alive. All of which leads to a finale that doesn't disappoint. Hugely enjoyable pic for like minded genre/style fans, that is on proviso it is ultimately an odd blend of genres that will not appeal to the casual film fan. 7/10

I've seen in my childhood and then in my adolescence a few light comedies by Michel Deville: Kiss Me General(1966)Martin Soldat (original title), The Bear and the Doll(1970) L'ours et la poupée (original title), The Woman in Blue(1973) La femme en bleu (original title). And I've seen Eddie Constantine in a few entertaining comedy thrillers. In this one he's doing what he knows best, pure comedy and some good beating. He is more natural than in anything else I've seen him, plus he has a very convincing melancholic air. It also occurs at some point and a puppy dog who actually plays a role. Georges Wilson is good as always in the role of good friend Simon. Jean-Pierre Darras is natural as well. Nice good simple film. Also, beautiful music by Georges Delerue.