Tag Archives: Jacques Deray

BORSALINO (JAQUES DERAY, 1970)

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Original Cinema Quad Poster – Movie Film Posters

Saw Borsalino last night, as good an example of a star vehicle as you’ll find. Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo are gangsters in 1930s Marseilles; Belmondo has taken over Delon’s girl while he serves time. When he gets out, they get into a fight over her, find they’re equally matched, team up and take-over the Marseilles mafia. Delon is feline, mysterious, aspiring to elegant living but not afraid to get dirty. Belmondo is good natured, happy with the simpler things, and likes to show off, either through his too-loud clothes or through his body, which is in much better shape than Delon’s. It’s a charming film, a good-natured pastiche of gangster films, all about fulfilling or playing with the audience’s expectations of what these particular stars do and the particular ways they glitter and shine. There are scenes of them in new suits, strutting up or down staircases, where you just know it’s designed to make the audience sigh or purr or go ‘WOW!’ That’s really what the whole film is for, a play on star personas to make them exponentially powerful together, rather like Brangelina at a later time. An enormous hit, a clear influence on THE STING in tone look, and even music. Perssonally I prefer watching the Delon/Belmondo to the Newman/Redford. A fun watch.

 

A great year for Delon as LE CERCLE ROUGE also made the list of top ten box office hits.

José Arroyo

Trois hommes à abattre/ Three Men to Kill (Jacques Deray, 1980)

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Delon made 28 films in the 70s, also producing about half of them, including TROIS HOMMES À ABATTRE, one of his best, and one of his most successful in this period. In his seventh collaboration with director Jacques Deray, Delon plays a professional poker player who drives by what he thinks is a car accident, makes the mistake of playing good Samaritan, and takes the driver to the hospital. That car accident turns out to be a hit, one put out by a large and powerful conglomerate whose multi-million dollar arms sale depends on certain information not leaking. They think Delon knows something and they’re out to get him. It takes a while for him to realise what he’s experiencing is not a coincidence — someone’s really out to kill him — and starts fighting back. But how can one man win against so many powerful forces?

 

An excellent thriller, one Delon made in a conscious attempt to give  ‘his public’ what he thought they wanted; a shy, beautiful and lonely cat, content in his own business, but who can bare his claws and become dangerous when threatened. The film’s in colour but so bleak it ends in pitch black noir mode; with an ending so dark Delon’s distributor in Japan changed it for fear his fans wouldn’t find it acceptable; a surprise since, unike Belmondo,  dying in films was hardly new to Delon. In this period villains always seem to love cats and art as much as they disdain people — surely a nod to Blofield in Bond — and Pierre Dux makes the most of his role. I also loved seeing Dalila Di Lazzaro as Delon’s girlfriend, very beautiful, funny and sexy, completely relaxed and open to the camera. I’d never heard of her. A noir worth looking out for.

Delon seems to wear white socks throughout the film; a practice then in vogue but, as far as i can tell, never seen before or since with Delon.

José Arroyo