Le Samourai (1967)

☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆

Le Samourai (1967) – J.-P. Melville

Is this the perfect distillation of Jean-Pierre Melville’s style (and, more indirectly, his themes about honour among thieves)? Alain Delon plays the solitary hitman who lives alone in a very grey room with only a brownish-grey bird in a cage for company. Paris is also grey and rainy and the synth soundtrack by François de Roubaix captures the melancholy mood. We see him carefully carry out a hit on a nightclub owner – as usual for Melville (and also Bresson) the action is depicted very methodically.  Delon has painstakingly prepared an alibi, so when he is inevitably picked up by the cops led by the persistent Commissaire (François Périer), they have to let him go.  It helps that the witnesses who saw him, including the club’s pianist (Cathy Rosier), all lie and say they don’t recognise him. (But Delon as Jef Costello does not know why). Still the police won’t give up and tail him around Paris. There are a few twists and turns that I won’t spoil – but they aren’t the kind that reduces the pleasure of the film once you know them. Melville’s style (as the maestro of French film noir) is endlessly immersive and rewarding. (This film also directly inspired John Woo’s The Killer, 1989). A masterpiece of the genre.