La môme Pigalle

With a title like that (chick of Pigalle) ,you expect the worst.And against all odds , your attention is sustained throughout.

It must be the screenplay (after all one of the collaborators was Jacques Companeéz whose filmography includes such works as "les maudits" and "la foire aux chimères) : the characters are all deceivers ,cheaters , and the "he who laughs last laughs longer (or best)"proverb can be applied to this movie .

The plot is derivative to a fault : an imprisoned gangster has hidden his loot (80 million Francs in jewels)and only his mistress knows the place.But the treatment (a long flashback) is not and sudden new developments abound .

Claudine Dupuis is eye candy for cheesecake buffs ,but she's upstaged by Dany Carrel ,who was brought up in a convent ,but became a hostess in a Pigalle nightclub where "you're supposed to make the guests drink ,but not to let them take you to a hotel room to spend the night ":that's what the hypocrit Monsieur Albert , the owner of this gai Paris strip tease cabaret ,tells an innocent young thing.In this part,Jean Tissier blows everyone off the screen ; his performance which verges on parody is riotously funny : see how smart he is as a drug trafficker (he calls his powder "bicarbonate")!