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Touchez pas au grisbi (Jacques Becker, 1954)
Super-cool gangster flick masquerading as a male-bonding character study featuring one of the coolest guys to ever grace the silver screen - Jean Gabin - who I consider the French Bogart. Gabin is so cool, he can easily get away with holding on to a buxom messenger's breast by asking her if she needs some help to support it on the way upstairs. Of course, even though Gabin was pushing it (he was 49 here), the messenger would prefer it better if he laid his hands all over her. I only mention this in passing because although there are plenty of scantily-clad women in the flick (including Jeanne Moreau and Dora Doll), the film is all about how men develop lifelong friendships and will do anything to maintain them, including defying death at every step. This also includes ignoring women just as much as paying them attention. Grisbi is mostly about Gabin's relationships with his best friends in crime, most of them now trying to live life peaceably in semi-retirement, but since they keep their hands in the game and own plenty of wealthy property, there will always be some other gang who thinks that they can take it away from them. The film is very good in the quiet scenes of character revelation, but it's actually quite solid as an action thriller when a spectacular nighttime car chase involving explosive gunplay appears near the end and is played very realistically.
Super-cool gangster flick masquerading as a male-bonding character study featuring one of the coolest guys to ever grace the silver screen - Jean Gabin - who I consider the French Bogart. Gabin is so cool, he can easily get away with holding on to a buxom messenger's breast by asking her if she needs some help to support it on the way upstairs. Of course, even though Gabin was pushing it (he was 49 here), the messenger would prefer it better if he laid his hands all over her. I only mention this in passing because although there are plenty of scantily-clad women in the flick (including Jeanne Moreau and Dora Doll), the film is all about how men develop lifelong friendships and will do anything to maintain them, including defying death at every step. This also includes ignoring women just as much as paying them attention. Grisbi is mostly about Gabin's relationships with his best friends in crime, most of them now trying to live life peaceably in semi-retirement, but since they keep their hands in the game and own plenty of wealthy property, there will always be some other gang who thinks that they can take it away from them. The film is very good in the quiet scenes of character revelation, but it's actually quite solid as an action thriller when a spectacular nighttime car chase involving explosive gunplay appears near the end and is played very realistically.