Le Deuxieme Souffle (Melville, 1966)

[madali]

Le Deuxieme Souffle (Jean-Pierre Melville, 1966)

Why are characters so utterly serious in 60s French films? They never seem to enjoy themselves. And when you have a movie about criminals, you want them to be bad, lead corrupt lives, be in danger, but at the very least, enjoy themselves. You see it in major crime films, such as "Scarface". You find them so appealing, because they seem to have a passionate for life, one that they are willing to take huge risks for. Why take risks, if you are bored with it? Get a 9-to-5 job instead.

In "Le Deuxieme Souffle", Gu escapes out of prison and engages in One Last Job. The one job in all heist movies that promises to be the final one for our character, therefore, it must go wrong. In the 150 minute version I saw, the actual heist is only a small part of the film, and the rest is filled with grim looking characters looking ultra serious. Might as well have been a movie about accountants.

2/5

[X.]

Melville was about macho melancholia which he perfected in LE CERCLE ROUGE.

[madali]

Unfortunately, I do seem to have this too