Pour la peau d'un flic

Obviously I'll watch anything with Tyrone Power or Alain Delon, but even I surprised myself with this. And I enjoyed it! Of course.

First off, may I say again that if there's anything I hate it's dubbing. Here Delon sounded like Robert Conrad. Everyone spoke English with American accents although the film takes place in France.

Someone here saw it in French because when Delon is injured and screams, his secretary tells him Burt Lancaster would never scream like that. The person who reviewed it said the name used was Belmondo. I wish I'd seen it in French.

Ex-cop Choucas, now a PI, is presently working on an embezzlement case at a pharmacist's. Then Isabelle Pigot hires him to investigate the disappearance of her blind daughter, Marthe Pigot, who worked at a foundation for the blind. Police Inspector Coccioli urges him to drop the case. But Choucas doesn't.

Choucas not only witnesses a killing, but is nearly killed himself, wounded, fights off two men in his office, and then his secretary is abducted. It doesn't seem as if anyone wants him to find Marthe.

Most of this film is a routine PI film, but it has humor, some good action, a little romance, and a bang-up finale. Delon is so sexy - and he wears the tightest pair of jeans I've ever seen. In fact, here his body has matured and the jeans push up some skin...when he shows his secretary where he was wounded, his short is off; he pulls the jeans down a little and sucks in that gut for all it's worth. Just a little trivia: This was something they always taught actors who stood in profile, but they don't seem to do it any longer. Dick Powell turned down the TV show Richard Diamond because "I can't hold my stomach in for 28 weeks."

Anyway, an enjoyable film.

Ex-cop is after a drug pusher gang. Completely average thriller starring and directed by Alain Delon. If you don't feel like losing or winning anything, watch this film. A short cameo by beautiful French actress Brigitte Lahaie might get many a heart pumping. Apart from that, the movie isn't too exciting. At least it's not really boring.

I do enjoy a good Alain Delon thriller, unfortunately this is not a good Alain Delon thriller. It would be slightly better without the accompanying music - a couple of songs that are just annoying. Like bad Tom Waits.

The plot is ludicrous, the acting perfunctory. There is predictable romance and nudity as you'd expect from a 1981 flic movie.

Disappointed really.

French cinema of nineteen eighties was known for its numerous popular films which gave a new dimension to box office collections."Pour La Peau D'Un Flic" is one such film which is not so much known by ordinary film viewers both in France and elsewhere.This might have something to do with the manner in which this film was distributed. It is sure that loyal Alain Delon fans would be aware that this film marked the beginning of his directorial career in 1981.Alain Delon gives one of his career's finest performances as a detective who would go to any length in order to bring cold blooded criminals to justice.As a film director he has not fought shy of portraying what ails police forces in France.In "Pour La Peau D'Un Flic",policemen are shown as real human beings with their fair share of weaknesses.Alain Delon's acting performance has too many shades of similarities with American actor Al Pacino although it would be politically incorrect to suggest such a comparison.This is a good film for all those people who would like to see Alain Delon both as an actor as well as a director in a same film.

Despite some extreme violence (shootings at close range, rape of one of the main characters), there is a surprising amount of humor in this picture. I wonder if this was Delon's way of moving away from the sometimes humorless approach taken in his films with J-P Melville. It also features a nice performance by a very young Anne Parillaud.