A Morte de um Corrupto

Terrific cast, lovely score and views of Paris, but Georges Lautner was always a mediocre director and it shows badly here with a very challenging script including many monologues and action scenes (a couple of car chases).

Delon as a producer-actor is always the same type: boring, verging on irritating hyper-cool hyper-straight... a supercharged common man. Since the dozen top actors in the supporting cast are all excellent (despite the pedestrian directing) it does not bog down the movie. But the heavy dialogue about political corruption all-around does put the movie in a merry-go-round that lasts for two hours. Not really my idea of a sharp noir.

The car chases (Rémi Julienne) are well-paced but kind of repetitive. Nice try to have one with trucks but it does not add much to the movie. All in all the 'irremediably corrupt political landscape' subtext is nicely impregnating the whole movie, thanks to Michel Audiard, but it gives a damp movie, like a fine pastry dumped for too long in an alcohol-laced preparation.

This film from the seventies, MORT D'UN POURRI (DEATH OF A CORRUPT MAN), was produced by and stars Alain Delon , who was remarkably handsome and talented, as everyone knows (or at least, as everyone knew, now that so much time has passed). It is a spectacularly well directed film by Georges Lautner, and the cinematography is equally stunning. The film is one of those French classics which are being restored nowadays in France and issued as Blu-Rays, accompanied by a DVD for those who cannot play Blu-Rays. This is one of the many such films which have now been issued with English subtitles. The film goes more deeply into the profundity and pervasiveness of French political corruption than most of the many French films on that subject. An outstanding modern example of the genre is the hair-raising TELL NO ONE (2006, see my review). The French are obsessed, and for good reason, with the corruption which pervades their government and society like rich seams of black coal running through a strip mine. So pervasive is corruption in France at the highest levels that one is tempted to say: 'There could be no recognisable France without corruption.' A morally clean French Government is as inconceivable as is a cesspool filled with pure spring water. Whereas political thrillers in America tend to portray corruption as an aberration, French films more often portray it as an intrinsic rot, like a leper displaying his disintegrating limb. Delon's old chum Philippe Dubaye, a Deputy in the French Parliament, comes to him in the middle of the night, while Delon is in bed with his adoring girlfriend (Mirielle Darc), and says something really terrible has happened. He has killed another Deputy in the Parliament. Without hesitation, Delon offers to help clean up the mess, but the mess becomes messier and more people are killed, as the ripples of corruption widen on the surface of the political pond. Every which way Delon turns, there are people being murdered, commencing with his close friend Philippe. After this, he becomes obsessed with discovering who killed him, which leads him into increasingly desperate dangers. He then befriends Phlippe's girlfriend, played by Ornetta Muti, who had the biggest and most alluring bedroom eyes in the film business at that time. When she looks at a man, he feels the heat as if someone has turned on the grill. Muti then effortlessly dominates the screen with all of her emanations of sex appeal, with the camera lovingly dwelling on her simmering looks. More and more outrageous attempts are made to try and murder Delon, who keeps scraping through impossible ambushes, such as cars falling on top of him. The dialogue was written by Michel Audiard, who also was a director himself. The twists and turns and multiple spiders' webs multiply faster than a spider can scuttle up a wall. The sinister air of menace is greatly heightened by the subtle performance of Klaus Kinski as one of the most powerful bad guys. This certainly is a cracking yarn, and is real edge of the seat stuff.

"Death of a Corrupt Man" from 1977 is a French film produced by Alain Delon's company, starring Delon, Ornella Muti, Stephanie Audran, Maurice Ronet, Klaus Kinski, and Delon's companion at that time, Mirelle Darc.

A deputy, Philippe Dubaye (Ronet) gets his old friend Xavier Maréchal (Delon) up in the dead of night. He says he has just killed racketeer, Serrano, who had many political connections. Serrano had proof of Dubaye's involvement in corruption in high places and was ready to use them against him.

Xav agrees to give his friend an alibi, which is not believed by the police. Everyone wants those documents and figure that Xav must have them. There are multiple car chases and attempts on his life and that of Dubaye's girlfriend (Muti).

Good film that is somewhat timely today, with all its talk of politicians stealing, people in government just in it for the money, blackmail, etc. Delon, who in this dubbing sounds like Robert Conrad, is strong in his role, as are Kinski and Audran.

Ornella Muti is positively gorgeous. Mirelle Darc was only in the film because of Delon; her part could have been cut and as it was, she only had a few lines. And how about this - an Alain Delon film with no love scene. Dubbed on top of it, which I hate.

Delon favored this type of role, as evidenced by the films he produced. I saw him later in a documentary done 37 years later. Everyone recognized him, at 81, and wanted a photo with him. He was very obliging.

"Death of a Corrupt Man" begins with, well, the death - or more accurately the murder - of a corrupt man. Only this corrupt man was keeping a detailed journal of his illegal activities and transactions, implicating a lot of the top politicians of Paris. The killer steals the journal and comes to the house of his best friend and president of a company (Alain Delon), in the middle of the night, asking for help. Delon agrees to provide him with an alibi, but there are plenty of people who will be ruined if the journal falls into the wrong hands, and they will stop at NOTHING to get it back. "Death of a Corrupt Man" is essentially the French answer to the popular American pessimistic political thrillers of its era ("Three Days of the Condor, "The Parallax View", etc.), with one man fighting against the entire corrupt system. It's a bit too long (120 minutes) and uneven: tense and involving at times (with some good car stunts by expert Remy Julienne) , talky and dull at other times. Alain Delon and Ornella Muti make a highly attractive leading couple, and give nicely understated performances as well. (**1/2)

I watched this film for its legendary Stan Getz soundtrack and the mesmerising Ornella Muti. But like the annoying Deer Hunter where the totally virtuous hero will leave no stone unturned for his friend and is afraid of nothing and no one, Delon battles the entire corrupt establishment single handedly and no bullet ever touches him. Actually the Deer Hunter is a lot better than this in that great realism and characterisation is set up in the first half then you have the unrealistic second half. In Delon produced films you usually have him in every single tiresome shot and he is totally invincible, uncorrupted and he has no sexual tenderness or weaknesses. He even did this formula for his son's movies which were tiresome wasted opportunities. I will never forgive how he destroyed Zurlini's masterpiece, Indian Summer, by having it recut and removing the scenes that had other people in it.