In the early eighties, in France, you still had some crime flcks, with for instance the three Jean Claude Missaien's films, LA BALANCE and a couple of other ones, all this before a long stop of more than a decade and a half and the birth of Olivier Marchal influence. Back to this one, directed by film maker and producer Sergio Gobbi, already in the business in the early seventies: LE TEMPS DES LOUPS. Here, he tried to stay in eighties fashion, concerning the topic - drug dealers, corrupted cops, neo nazis - and also technical details about directing, details that you did not have ten years earlier. Music for instance, and editing too. This is a lousy job, sloppy, corny, a real junk movie, only saved by Marcel Bozzufi, terrific here in a nasty police superintedant whilst Daniel Auteuil tries to do his best to imitate Jean Paul Belmondo in his character, but without humor. It is fast paced, agreeable to watch, though badly made, I repeat,and especially gloomy. Good action scenes in Belleville district in Paris, a district that doesn't exist now under this form, because constructions and architecture mutation. Good ending. And it is amusing to see French police cars with American cops sirens....
Review of L'arbalète
