Le choix des armes

Alain Corneau was considered as a director who could replace Jean-Pierre Melville's, I mean the new master of the crime film made in France. First there was POLICE PYTHON 357, LA MENACE, then SERIE NOIRE, and just after LE CHOIX DES ARMES. Corneau did not direct only crime dramas, but those ones were his best work, with also the DEUXIEME SOUFFLE remake (2007), three years before his death. Here, you have a perfect cast: Yves Montand, Gerard Depardieu, Gerard Lanvin, Catherine Deneuve.... The story is not that usual, rather unpredictable and I particularly like Gerad Lanvin's ambivalent character, as a trigger happy brutal, ambitious, ruthless young cop.

.. of superlatives. This, the last of the three polars that Corneau made top-billing Montand, finds Montand retired from the mob and roughing it with Catherine Deneuve in a large country chateau where they breed thoroughbreds. Such an idyll can't last, natch, so, before you can say 'make my day, punk', enter Depardieu, hothead extaordinaire, on the lam and looking for a soft touch. Eventually we need the obligatory scene in which the ageing gunfighter dusts off the old six-shooter and wastes the wannabee new fastest gun, except, of course, that this isn't a Western but a very sophisticated and hugely enjoyable polar.It doesn't get any better than Montand and Depardieu (who had worked together earlier in Claude Sautet's 'Vincent, Paul, Francois et les autres' and would do so again in 'Jean de Florette') and with Corneau on bullhorn what's not to like. Post-war French policiers/polars are in a class of their own and provided your nose is in good working order the whiff of cordite can be identified at once as generated by Jean Pierre Melville, Alain Corneau, Tavernier, etc. This one is right out of the top drawer and would BE a top drawer on any screen it graced. Go see! Enjoy!

'Choice of Arms' (the French title is 'Le choix des armes') made in 1981 is a very typical film for the genre of film noir in the French cinema of the 70s and 80s. The master of the genre was Jean-Pierre Melville who died in 1973, leaving behind only 14 films, but a few masterpieces among them. Alain Corneau, the director of 'Choice of Arms' was one of his followers. This film shows his professional qualities, and withstands the test of time, mainly due to its stellar cast.

This is the story of the aftermath of an escape from prison, of the mob milieu friends of the evaders who shelter and help them, and of the cops who are following them, a story that tragically turns bad and worse as it advances. As in many films of the genre, the two worlds - crime and law - are interlinked by sometimes invisible threads. In each of them two generations are confronted, the old generation of active or retired gangsters and policemen on one side, the young violent criminals and ambitious policemen on the other side. Corruption rules at all levels. Good intentions and human feelings hardly survive the pursuits and shootings.

The cinematographic production is quite minimalist. Part of the story takes place in the streets and on muddy country roads, with the street corners and intersections playing an important role in the action. Sumptuous villas and the overcrowded apartments in the 'banlieus' clearly separate the social categories. The color palette is very strictly controlled, the film could have been very well made in black and white. Gérard Depardieu plays here the role of a criminal, disturbed young man, anti-social beyond any hope, who destroys everything around, and first of all destroys his own life. Depardieu does not show yet the charisma and especially the humor that characterize many of his later great roles, he has moments of overacting, but the hopeless uncertainty and the aspiration to get out of the vicious circle of crime are excellently rendered. Yves Montand and Catherine Deneuve form a couple that seems to descend from another film, but precisely the contrast between his carved by life noble calm together with her vulnerable beauty and the brutal story and the acts of violence around manage to create drama and tension. The soundtrack is also very interesting. At times, the violins and sentimental melodies in the style of the 50s are used annoyingly, but in other jazz improvisations on guitar and soul music (Janis Joplin if I'm not mistaken) are a perfect match for what happens on screen. 'Choice of Arms' may not be Alain Corneau's best film, but it is worth watching or re-watching.

With Melville's death, Tavernier and Corneau became the masters of French film noir, but the latter has the dreamlike mood that the genre really needs to be effective. Le choix des armes has many effective scenes (usually involving either Depardieu or Lanvin) but sometimes leaves us cold. There is a little too much exposition in the storytelling--why show us Montand and his buddy smashing up the gang lord's opulent house when there is no dramatic effect to be gained? Or the elaborate four-way car pursuit (did the budget allow for all those stunt-drivers, so Corneau thought Why not?).

The acting is mostly exceptional. The young Gérard Lanvin gives us a very frustrated young detective, Michel Galabru is his burnt-out superior, Richard Anconina plays a man trying to settle down to happy domesticity and failing, and Depardieu is simply great as Mickey le dingue, crazy and moving at the same time. The woman who plays Dany's wife with burning resentment takes over every scene she's in.

A gracefully paced and ably directed work featuring highly talented players, including Gerard Depardieu and Catherine Deneuve, along with Yves Montand, LE CHOIX DES ARMES is generally successful as cinematic art, although it must be stressed that it should properly be viewed in its French language format, since the subtitled American release is harshly cut and reveals post-production efforts not at all sympathetic with the original release. An escaped convict and killer, Mickey (Depardieu), chooses to hide from police pursuit upon the lavish estate of former organized crime doyen Noel Durrieux (Montand) and his wife Nicole (Deneuve, with a wonderfully layered interpretation of her rôle), but when detectives come near, Mickey flees to Paris, although he soon returns, bringing about a conflict between two criminal codes after Mickey believes that Durrieux has informed police of the escapee's location. There are carefully fleshed out parts here for numerous characters as the two principal antagonists career toward an inevitable climactic meeting, it becoming increasingly apparent that there are lessons to be learned beyond those of the scenario and they may not be divulged by ancillary figures. Auteur Corneau's metronomic tone mates well with the script's finely balanced, rather spare, dialogue, and with a complex plot not immediately pervious to a viewer, the film benefits from the director's ability to weave a diverse cast of characters into a discriminatory dramatic construction. Deneuve earns acting honours, while Depardieu is highly effective as a sociopath savaged by paranoia yet displaying a wide range of emotional engagement with disparate characters, and Montand is icily persuasive as a "retired" mob leader who is forced to reenter his past in the hope of achieving safety for him and his wife. Following a slowly gaited but logical storyline is difficult with the extensive cutting performed upon the film's U.S. version, that is burdened as well with poor sound transference and largely inferior processing, very unfortunate in this instance of a solidly crafted motion picture that deserves better.