Sans mobile apparent

In the city of Nice, in the beautiful and sunny French Riviera, a sniper cold-heartedly assassinates four people in less than 48 hours. There isn't an obvious connection between the victims, but since they are all upper-class society members, chief-commissioner Carella senses a lot of pressure to catch the killer fast and to prevent further murders from happening.

It's been such a long since I watched a good old-fashioned, authentic giallo! Okay, so "Without Apparent Motive" is French instead of Italian, and a sniper rifle isn't exactly a traditional giallo murder weapon, but still I feel it qualifies as a bona fide giallo! After all, many delicious trademarks are well-represented, like the convoluted whodunit plot, a mysterious but merciless killer, a struggling police commissioner and many gorgeous women. Dominique Sanda, Carla Gravina and especially Stéphane Audran look lethal and incredibly seductive in their roles.

Although named "Without Apparent Motive", the assassin certainly has a motive for the murders he/she commits, and the gradual and suspenseful revelation of the motive is definitely the strongest quality of the movie. Trintignant plays in his very own typical love-or-hate-him style. I always wonder if he just acts arrogant, or really is arrogant. The locations and scenery are amazing, the great Ennio Morricone wrote another fantastic score, and many sequences are masterfully photographed.

A sniper is killing off a series of people who seem to be connected in some way. A detective investigating the case seems to come into contact with the victims shortly before they are dispatched.

This is a stylish French murder-mystery set in Nice. It's well served on the acting personnel front. Jean-Louis Trintignant is very good in the central role as the brooding detective; while there is interesting support from others, such Stéphane Audran (leading lady from several Claude Chabrol films) and Jean-Pierre Marielle (who played a memorable flamboyant homosexual private investigator in Dario Argento's giallo Four Flies on Grey Velvet). Another welcome addition is Ennio Morricone's contribution; once again his score is excellent and adds to the atmosphere greatly. The dark story is offset effectively by its beautiful sunny locations too. It adds a bit of glamour to the grime.

Sans Mobile Apparent is a well-constructed mystery with good plotting. It's a movie that is screaming out for a DVD transfer, it's one of the stronger French thrillers from the 70's.

... and his best.All that he made afterward can easily be dismissed as rubbish.A journalist -he also wrote words for some songs- he dreamed of the American cinema because he spent some of his youth on the other side of the pond.

Actually,we're closer to Agatha Christie's whodunit than to American film noir.It's not a problem.It's better to have a good imitation of a detective story à la "and then there were none" than a pale reflection of Wise or Hawks.One by one,people who did something nasty in the past are slain and detective Trintignant is here to solve the mystery ,a mystery which entertains the audience till the very end .Outside Trintignant,the cast is very odd,including French crooner Sacha Distel,as an emcee of a stupid radio contest (a wonderful spoof) ,Segal, who wrote "love story" ,Chabrol's then-wife (and ex-wife of Trintignant)and best actress Stephane Audran,Italian not yet sex symbol Laura Antonelli ,here cast against type,Jean-Pierre Marielle...

Very entertaining.

... Nice (impossible to miss that title, hey Hugh and JJ?)

If Philippe Labro isn't a great film noir director like Melville or Corneau, his polars are however entertaining. There are some very fine scenes in "Sans Mobile Apparent", pop and sexy like an italian criminal movie. In fact, it's quite close to giallo, with a terrible secret surrounding the killings in that privileged town of Nice, but these killings are made with a rifle by a sniper. Philippe Labro was mainly a journalist and he covered the most well known sniper story, Kennedy's killing. Labro loved guns and rifles, we feel it in this movie.



What bothers me is that Labro shot that polar as a cinephile, giving Trintignant some Bogart gestures like Godard with Belmondo in "Breathless", and those few new wave quotes are rather painful to me, Trintignant's character should have been more worked, he is too much stereotyped, sometimes being too much without explanation. But the sulfurous 70s atmosphere is great, the girls are sexy (Audran, Sanda, Gravina) and master Morricone's score is sumptuous.

Philippe Labro must love "the Sniper" by Edward Dmytryk.

I had seen this film in a cinema, years ago, when I was a youngster. Now, I have bought the video in a 2nd hand shop, and...

I has been delighted again with:

a) The plot: good thriller about a snipper who kills several high society persons.

b) The actors: Jean-Louis Trintigant is superb as a policeman,engaged in a difficult case. And he runs top speed...

c) The music: Morricone's score is perfect. It goes along very well and underline top moments.

To summarize: highly commandable film.