Le fils

Yves Montand gives here a delightful performance as a French gangster in New York who decides one day to return to Corsica where he is born and find out how was father died. He discovers that the old man was killed during a hunting party. Marcel Bozzuffi is also very convincing as a hired killer disguised as a real estate agent. But a little flaw in the script though. When he meets Montand in the mountain, and then shows how he uses a gun and being a sharp shooter, it would have been better if he had faked to miss the target. But on the condition that there should have been another scene before in the film ( that was not) in which we would have seen him being on the contrary a real gunfighter. The scene with Montand - Bozzuffi missing the target - would have meant that Bozzuffi hid something to Montand. The audience then would have wondered WHY this character, does he hide his skills with a gun, what is the purpose?

This kind of screen writing trick, where the audience already knows something about a character, far more than another character does, is rarely used. And for me, that's real suspense, because we wonder why does he hide, or what will be the behavior of the second character when he'll find out, or when will he find out?

See what I mean?

Anyway, I love this French movie typically of the seventies and shot in the splendid Corsican settings. Director Pierre Granier Deferre will give us twelve years later L'HOMME AUX YEUX D'ARGENT, with more or less the same plot; a man returning home after many years before facing his tragic fate.

In spite of Yves Montand,the movie was not a big success for Pierre Granier-Deferre ,a director whose works found a huge audience in the seventies,although the critics,still Under the Nouvelle Vaguelette's thumb,were more reserved .Today,they seem to have stood the time quite well:ground-breaking ,they were absolutely not.They were good stories,well told,well acted ,reviving the grand tradition of the "Cinema De Qualité " ,a label which was never pejorative to my eyes.

Take "Le Fils" (=the son) :although its hero is a NY gang leader -a Corsican who emigrated -,it is not an action-packed movie : on the contrary ,it is a pastoral ,ecological (Mr Montand would reportedly have qualified the movie so)and quiet atmosphere,with a vague menace hanging over the hero's head ,like a sword of Damoclès .We can feel something threatening in those luminous splendid landscapes (the movie was entirely filmed on location in Corsica;the director thanks the local inhabitants for their cooperation) but the screenplay focuses on life in a place where time seems to have stood still : the old dying mama ,who has probably never left her village ,the teacher still using inkwells whereas on the mainland the pen -holder was fast becoming a thing of the past,the brother guarding his sheep ...

The movie moves very slowly and it may have discouraged some viewers ,who,after the first pictures in a desert New York city ,may have expected a genuine thriller ;it is actually vignettes of Corsica circa 1970,before tourism en masse:the most moving moment is when Montand and his teacher recite La Fontaine's "Les Animaux Malades De La Peste":the old man does not remember the words ,but his former pupil does ,a way for him to remember a time when he was young and innocent .Although he stays in touch with his accomplices (phone calls to American),we feel his regret not to have lived a simple safe life like his sibling (Frederic De Pasquale) who married his teenage squeeze (Léa Massari) he actually always loves.

Like this? Try these ......

La Loi Du Survivant (José Giovanni ,1967)

Le Paria (Carliez,1968)

A remarkable dramatic film. The time goes slowly: Ange has returned to Corsica because his mother is dying. Then Ange wants to know about the death of his father. He is looking for the people (the carpenter, the homeles etc) who could say something. At the same time it's for him time of memories, his young love with Maria, the meeting with the school teacher.

A very interesting film with the great performances of Yves Montand, Marcel Bozzuffi, Lea Massari, Frédéric de Pasquale and Germaine Delbat.