Crime no Asfalto

No, it's not Panama; Paname is slang for Paris. It's from another August le Breton movie, and it stars Jean Gabin, with a big role for Gert Frobe and a featured part for a coin-flipping George Raft. If Paramount was producing Geezer westerns in the States, then perhaps this was a Geezer Gangster flick.

Gabin and Frobe have a racket smuggling gold into Tokyo and antiquities out of Japan. They use people with no police records and have settled on Claudio Brook, a reporter. What they don't know is that he is an undercover agent investigating their racket, and one that Frobe has smuggling spare parts into Cuba. As he worms his way into Gabin's graces, some one is trying to muscle in on the racket, blowing up associates in Munich and London. Frobe wants to abandon the Tokyo run for another, better idea. Gabin wants to keep going until the new one is paying. Nadja Tiller, Frobe's wife and Gabin's ex-lover, wants to fight.

It's still le Breton's world as first seen in Jules Dassin's movie, only bigger, brighter and in wide screen. Little fish have gotten bigger and attracted the notice of big fish on both sides of the law, but it's still guys with some rules against guys with none. The time for such movies was passing. The New Wave had no use for movies like this, but so long as as Gabin was willing to appear in them, they would still keep making them; and I will still watch and enjoy them fifty years later.

It was the second time George Raft had been cast in a supporting part of a French movie (see :"nous irons à Paris")and watching him play opposite Gabin is a delight : the way the French deceives him is hilarious ;and one wishes there were more lines such as " no ambulance needed; got to scrape' em off the ground!'.But this screenplay was not strong material and Michel Audiard was not at hand to write punchy lines.

Besides , the story is disjointed and ,with a few exceptions ,Denys De La Patellière is generally a mediocre director .He cannot hold a candle to Jules Dassin,who made another memorable "rififi"

The main interest lies in the international cast. Apart from Raft , it includes Mexican- English Claudio Brook , German Gert Froebe and Nadja Tiller and plenty of French up-and-coming stars such as Claude Brasseur and a very sexy Mireille Darc .

The scenes between Gabin and Froebe stand out too: "Goldfinger" is an antique dealer ,his façade of respectability which conceals his international smuggling :an esthete , and also , totally unexpected ,a political activist ; "you couldn't comprehend",he says to a scowling Gabin .

By all accounts Auguste le Breton led a very colourful life. His novels depicting the Parisian underworld were based upon personal knowledge and possess an authenticity which made them eminently suitable for film. Jules Dassin's 'Rififi chez des hommes' of 1955 is an undisputed masterpiece of the genre but three subsequent attempts to capitalise on the 'Rififi' name have proved pretty dismal, the last of which is this one. Breton's style happened to suit the 'mature' Gabin but of the four Breton adaptations in which he starred this is undoubtedly the worst. Gabin is going through the motions here as a well-groomed, well-tailored low life whose international smuggling operation is threatened by an equally well-groomed, well-tailored low life played by George Raft doing his customary impression of a plank. The script calls upon Raft at one stage to flip a coin which is what he does best. Claudio Brook plays a US Treasury agent which is a far cry from his 'Simon of the Desert' for Bunuel. Gert Froebe makes the best of it and Najda Tiller who had previously appeared in 'Rififi chez des femmes' has a crummy role. This travelogue takes us from Paris to London and Tokyo to the accompaniment of a terminally irritating score by Georges Garvarentz in a film aimed at the lowest common denominator. In his previous film, also directed by Denys de la Patilliere, Gabin had given a standout performance as a misanthropic alcoholic but his compulsion to work alas led to more misses than hits in his later years. This does not seem to matter for as Michael Caine once observed: "People only remember the good ones". Just as well!

I must say I haven't seen this movie for a very long time. Having a very fine souvenir, I decided to watch it again, and what a pleasure. If you like french gangster movies with our Jean Gabin, powerful slang dialogs and 60's design, this one is really for you. Without forgetting George Raft facing Gabin. And Fröbe, Bozzuffi, Ceccaldi, Brasseur, Mireille Darc (so sexy), Nadja Tiller ...

And international sequences in Japan, London, Germany.

A very special palm to Claudio Brook, very very convincing.

Indeed, a powerful french gangster movie.

As gentleman Philippe wrote, so few reviewers?

In kanopy, it's called upper hand. En françe, it's du rififi â paname. Jean gabin is paul berger, well known thief. Now he's using couriers to run gold to countries where it's worth more. And he accidentally hires a copper to make a run from london to tokyo. Not a lot of suspense, but some well known faces and international intrigue. It's all okay. Script needed some jazzing up. And the translation for the subtitles is less than optimal. George raft is binnagio. And keep an eye out for gert fröbe as walter at 32 minutes in; he was the bad guy in goldfinger and ... chitty chitty bang bang... of course! At 29 minutes in, there's an ad for a "black and white minstrel show", so that might offend some. It's entertaining. Directed by denys de la patellière.