Orpheus… I’ll agree that the ‘cool’ critic thing is overdone and blown way out of proportion. I think it works in totality, flaws and all…. like every film has…. you don’t. C’est la vie.
Orpheus – dude – after perusing through your list of favorites I’m very surprised that you’d be so quick to dismiss this film and describe it as absurd or ridiculous. I’d be very interested in knowing how many of your favorites you consider to have water tight plausibility. I think this comes down to your personal preference more so than the film’s lack of substance or merit. I don’t think Melville is attempting to compete with Hitchcock for the master of suspense – they’re two different directors all together – so relax buddy. There’s nothing wrong in Le Samourai not being a film you take to, but to strike out against it for the reasons you have reveals inconsistency in your opinions. Le Samourai is an excellent film.
Melville knows it’s all a farce. The last gesture made in the film is a musician returning to his drum set and doing a riff, as though a stand-up act has just made a middling joke.
I’m taking the film just as seriously as he took it.
if you’re being serious, I think you found something no one else has Orpheus? Melville said it was about schizophrenia, not generally too many laughs there… then again you might just be taking the piss….. hate it by all means, but if you’re arguing against it some coherant thoughts would be handy.
Melville also made up the “quote” from the “Book of Bushido” that opens the film. He was a trickster and an imp, much in the way that Hitchcock crafted his public persona. That diagnosis has no substantial basis in the film.
Is there anything in the movie which you consider plausible evidence of Jef Costello being a schizophrenic?
I don’t have coherent thoughts about it because there is nothing coherent there to have thoughts about.
Orpheus.. I know about the quote, but it completely sets the tone for the film, so it was no glib throwaway line… it was the key to unlock the door.
As for the schizophrenia, I agree there’s not much evidence for it… but if you view the ability to compartmentalise your behaviour to the point where you can take money to kill people but still maintain the semblance of relationships with others then I think some kind of personality disorder is a valid call.
Great film of course-but contrast it to what was going on in the States in 1967, Bonnie and Clyde,Cool Hand Luke, Dirty Dozen, Point Blank etc: http://www.filmsite.org/1967.html This one is so 30’s , 40’s and 50’s. No pandering to the audience here with such things as sound , story and action For a similar audacious directorial take- try to find LAKE TAHOE by the Mexican Eimbecke, If you like static shots, you’ll love his work. Talk about a doomed esthetic-give em credit for trying.Now I’ll go see the rest of Melville and early Godard again.
The opening shot of “Le Samouraï” is one of my favourite shots in all of cinema.
Melville’s films aren’t really crime thrillers. They’re abstract riffs on crime thriller themes. No one in 1967 ran around Paris dressed like Alan Ladd circa 1945.
I, too, thought it was a tad over-rated. The premise sounded nice: a contract killer with samurai-like instincts who is very meticulous and never gets caught. However, within the film’s first 20 minutes, he kills someone very publicly and leaves behind 6 witnesses and is arrested. From that point on, the police are onto him. WORST ASSASSIN EVER.
Sorry to dissent, but this film left me a bit cold. Not crazy about Melville’s work, as much as I wanted to be.
I love this movie to pieces. Everything about it was perfect to me, and I am counting the days until it’s released on Blu Ray in a flawless, non scrubbed, non filtered, faithful to film, transfer from Criterion
I have the Criterion dvd and was reading through the booklet in it. One of the essays mentions that this film deserves one scene where Alain Delon bursts out laughing uncontrollably in his spartan apartment. I would’ve like this movie a thousands times more if there was a shot of this description, but I still love it.
Orpheus M: I don’t think Jef (Delon) had a phone in his apartment. Hence, no wiretap. I find the first microphone ridiculously large as well, but the replacement is discreet.
Melville died the year after the Godfather came out, even then, retitling of European films for the American market was and still is common.
I saw this on Monday for the fourth time, so much care is put into the editing, color scheme, camera movement, etc. that it’s gone up a few ranks in my personal top 10. It’s not cool so much as muted, you could go so far as to call it early contemplative cinema in a genre not often associated with that style. I can understand disliking it for that reason, especially if you prefer Hitchcock, whose works are full of emotional valleys and peaks (esp. Vertigo).
Agreed with Henri Tero, the Blu-ray will probably come out October 2011, Criterion has been putting out Melville since January at the rate of 2 upgrades, 1 new release (Army of Shadows, Le Cercle Rouge, Leon Morin) and, this being Melville’s most famous film.
If you like Le Samourai, there is an American film similar in tone and story from 1958 called Murder by Contract. It’s about a killer with no feelings who get hired to kill someone and has misgivings. The musician element is also in there.
Le Samourai isn’t supposed to be grounded in reality. I think that Jeff is more lucky than he is efficient at his job. His attitude is what creates the impression that he’s good at his job. I think that’s part of the comedy in the film. If it didn’t have these elements of things going wrong, it would be even more cold. The mistakes that the characters commit are what makes the film more interesting.
I guess “Murder by Contract” could be seen as a sort of influence on “Le Samourai”. There do seem to be some similarities. Maybe that’s worth looking into further if someone cares to do so.
It’s a common them in all Melville films it seems that people make mistakes. Mathilde holds onto the photo of her daughter in Army of Shadows. In Le Cercle Rouge, they place the tied up security guard next to the alarm although that wasn’t really their downfall. Of course, there was a whole slew of other things. For example, they only started getting into trouble when dealing with fences post-robbery. They should have just lied low for a while or sold/pawned the jewelry in small amounts.
Deuxieme Souffle is y favorite but Samourai is my second, Delon’s dead pan is well done as well as framing and rythm.
“They should have just lied low for a while or sold/pawned the jewelry in small amounts.”
I’m sure Melville thought of this quote from Huston’s “The Asphalt Jungle”
Emmerich: “…and the rocks, sell them one at a time. There’d be no hurry. They’d last a lifetime.”
Doc: “You can’t go peddling stuff like this on the open market. The cops would be on you after the first sale!”
I love Le Samurai. Ghost Dog by Jim Jarmusch is also influenced by Le Samurai.
Dalton R.
This was a great film, but i’m not sure if it was my favorite of Melville’s.