Trampa diabólica

In Paris, the newspaper seller Pascal (Lino Ventura) is a simple, but honest man respected by his friends. He has a love affair with Germaine "Mémène" Montillie (Dora Doll), who works distributing newspaper to the sellers. One day, Pascal is resting nearby the Sena, he sees a man jumping into the water of the rives trying to commit suicide. Pascal saves him and the man, Didier Barrachet (Robert Hirsch), tells him that he is in unrequited love with his wife, Catherine Barrachet (Andréa Parisy), but his brother-in-law Phillipe Barrachet (Alfred lAdam) and she want to intern him in a mental institution to steal his wealth. Pascal brings Didier home and help him to prove that he is telling the truth. He also visits Catherine that confirms Didier's story. Out of the blue, Didier is murdered at home and Pascal is accused of killing him. But when Pascal looks at the body, the man is not Didier. But the smart inspector Dodelot (Jean Desailly) wants more evidences to blame Pascal.

"125 rue Montmartre" (1959) is a pleasant French film-noir, with Lino Ventura in the role of a good man. The story is sordid, with Robert Hirsch and Andréa Parisy framing the street vendor. Jean Desailly performs an intelligent and witty police inspector that uses his experience to resolve the case. My vote is seven.

Title (Brazil): "O Caso da Rua Montmartre" ("The Case of the Montmartre Street")

Gilles Grangier was never an auteur and a lot of his movies are really bad. But "Le désordre et la nuit" was good. "125 rue Montmartre" , more a Boileau-Narcejac ("Diabolique" ) detective story style than a true film noir, is quite entertaining and , given the stranglehold the Nouvelle Vague bestowed on French cinema, it's kinda breath of fresh air. Although by no means a New Wave movie, it shares with the younger filmmakers a shooting on location, in the streets of Paris, with its bistros, its newspaper sellers, even its impressive houses.

The chemistry between Lino Ventura and Robert Hirsch is great to watch. A great movie.

Another of my favourite films to have been reissued on DVD by Réné Château, who, as usual, haven't had the good (commercial) sense to include subtitles on their DVD so that deaf French viewers and all other prospective foreign viewers can appreciate the film - incredible !

This story and the film are the embodiment of Paris of the late 1950's with all its charm - so different from the ugly Paris of today ! Lino Ventura, one of the great franco-Italian actors sadly no longer with us plays the part of Pascal a "crieur" or newspaper seller on the banks of the Seine who unfortunately gets involved in a sinister plot hatched by a woman and her lover who want to get rid of the woman's husband.

The story is very well done and the quality is equal to that of some of Alfred Hitchcock's earlier films. I love the theme music by Jean Yatove, which cannot be found any where on cd to my great dismay, and this music is typical of the late 1950's. So beyond the story itself ( which is more interesting first time round when you don't know the outcome ) the film has the interest for me as a living documentary of Paris of that era - we get to see quite a number of the different streets of Paris, the banks of the Seine, and how the "popular" or "working" parisian lives, as opposed to the touristy cabaret areas !

I would seriously recommend this film more than any other to someone wishing to "taste" the atmosphere of that era in Paris, an atmosphere long lost to the annals of time ! Another good film for this kind of thing would be "Voici le Temps des Assassins" starring Jean Gabin. One funny thing, the title 125 rue Montmartre has absolutely no relevance in the film at all, and would appear to have been thought up by its director on the spur of the moment for want of something better !

I enjoyed very much this black criminal story.

A newspaper vendor is envolved in a murder story and will fight for his innocence !

The dialogues written by Michel Audiard are very good.

Great performances of Lino Ventura, Dora Doll, Andréa Parisy , Robert Hirsch, Lucien Rambourg (the brother of Bourvil) and Pierre Desailly.