Cannabis

I read the French novel from which this film is inspired. Lousy but pleasant book, and so easily flexible in terms of adaptation that I hardly understand such a result on screen. A mobster from New York arrives in France and is charged to replace an important drug traffic ring. You see, some kind of JOHNNY COOL - the film starring Henry Silva - topic, which would have been great. But no, this garbage seems to be a Nouvelle Vague material, Jean Luc Godard like crap, especially speaking of the writing, the story, so silly. The directing is not so bad though and the main interest is for sure the couple Serge Gainsbourg - Jane Birkin.

Jane Birkin is supposed to be this girl from a good background but we know it just because the cop (Gabrielle "Avventura" Ferzetti) tells us so.

The film was produced by Andrée Debar ,an actress of the fifties who had a strange androgynous look.Why she stopped acting remains a mystery as why Serge Gainsbourg stopped singing and writing to play such a poor part in a hackneyed movie.At least he wrote the score and the cast and credits song,which are much too good for a director who leaves his actors to their own devices.

"This is not a movie about drugs " a line reads at the beginning ;it's a love film,an action-packed film...As far as the love film is concerned ,we have good-looking Jane Birkin naked every ten minutes;as for the action,highlights are ,so to speak,a chase on the roof of the opera -without a phantom- and a massacre in a chicken farm.

"Cannabis " is a relic of the late sixties,which would be forgotten,weren't it for the legendary Birkin/Gainsbourg lovers who fortunately knew better times.

Not a great film, but a nice soundtrack by the main man. Serge Gainsbourg looks incredibly cool to the point that he could rival Alain Delon. His performance is a bit flat, possibly because he wasn't directing. Jane Birkin also not really given much to do apart from being naked.

The DVD has poor picture quality, it's almost like an upscaled VHS tape and only 2.0 sound.

The title "French Intrigue" is only half right; the film does take place mostly in France, but it is very un-intriguing. According to IMDb, this was Pierre Koralnik's second directorial effort; I don't know if he improved later on, but at this point he absolutely could not direct: the film is very poorly put together, with an almost complete lack of basic transition shots. The script is incoherent and uninteresting. Serge Gainsbourg is supposed to be on a drug-busting mission, but he looks as if he was on drugs himself when this was made! Occasional nudity by Jane Birkin is the film's only redeeming virtue, but I'd still suggest that you avoid "French Intrigue" at all costs. * out of 4.

This movie had a lot of potential: a great cast including Curd Juergens, Serge Gainsbourg and Jane Birkin, and outstanding qualities in cinematography and editing. I have seen few films with so many intense close-ups and surprising cuts. Unfortunately, the movie has no story to tell. It is just another gangster movie with everybody being everybody else's enemy. "Cannabis" could have become a weird, more outrageous, experimental and revolutionary version of Melville's "Le Samourai", but the movie ends up as a failure, albeit a visually stunning one.