RIFIFI (1955)

Rififi / Du rififi chez les hommes, Jules Dassin’s most celebrated and well-known film, was a French production from an American director who would end up pursuing his filmmaking career in both countries, before going on to live and work in Greece. His first move, from the US to France, was not strictly by choice. A victim of the Hollywood Blacklist, Dassin first fled to the UK so that he could complete one last film shoot for the American studio system, before being left without work. An offer for his contribution as a director in France led to him completing a project there, with Rififi, his follow-up film, going on to earn him the ‘Best Director’ award at the 1955 Cannes Film Festival.

And for good reason, with the striking heist film— one of the originators of this film genre —featuring a roughly half-hour long sequence of the heist itself, where its operators work diligently in silence, hacking away at the ground below them, disabling alarms, and stealing a car so that their criminal exploits won’t be so easy to trace. This extended scene mightn’t be spellbinding—with little presumption that the group will be caught, it doesn’t contain the deliciously anxious notes that the scenes in films like The Hole / Le Trou (1960) do— but it’s engrossing all the same. Superbly directed and paced, it is almost tempting to ignore the film as a whole and focus only on this section.

Dassin’s 1955 movie follows downtrodden ex-convict Tony (Jean Servais), who served five years in prison for taking the fall for his friend Jo (Carl Möhner). While he holds little resentment towards Jo (especially given that he’s godfather to his friend’s son Tonio [Dominique Maurin]), whatever happiness this protagonist might have experienced is lost to him now. We might get little insight into what prison life was like, but it’s clear as day that Tony is joyless back in the free world. He manages to do a good job of holding himself upright, maintaining a cool and detached air even as life’s tragic notes keep him feeling dejected.

The goodwill viewers feel compelled to extend to this tortured yet noble figure crumbles when he meets his ex-girlfriend Mado (Marie Sabouret), who is now dating gang leader and nightclub owner Pierre Grutter (Marcel Lupovici). Asking her to take off her jewellery, then her clothing, Tony slaps her almost a dozen times, this off-screen violence tearing apart the notion that this character is stoic and aloof (and, most importantly, a decent person). His anger is justified, even if the way it’s expressed reduces this tragic figure to a brutish thug. While Tony likes to pity himself by feeling as though life has passed him by, it is he who gets in his own way. His actions on behalf of others land him in prison for years, while his festering anger over his girlfriend’s failure to remain loyal to him stops this ex-con from pursuing a relationship with her or anyone else once he’s free.

Feeling as though he has nothing and no one left to turn to, he accepts the bank heist offer brokered to him by Mario Ferrati (Robert Manuel), a joyful, exuberant gangster, which Carl had already been eager to accept. Putting the wheels into motion requires the aid of César (Jules Dassin), an expert safe-cracker with a love for the ladies that lands him in the arms of nightclub singer Viviane (Magali Noël). Viviane is the only one to reference this film’s title, doing so on a number of occasions in a light-hearted song that Rififi’s key players observe from their seats. The scene is inessential, just like Viviane’s relationship with César, but both elements of this story are enjoyable all the same. As for the safe-cracker, he is portrayed remarkably well by the director (who used the pseudonym ‘Perlo Vita’ in crediting this role). The character might not be as indispensable as Tony, Carl, or Mario, yet Dassin is present in so many scenes that it makes this film’s impeccable direction all the more impressive.

But although the criminal hijinks that ensue are the epitome of movie magic, this film is noticeably weaker when it comes to conveying a sense of urgency. It would be wrong to say that the group work at an unhurried pace when executing their master plan, but since they are operating in near silence late at night with no one else around, there’s never any sense of immediate danger lurking around the corner. One also doesn’t ever expect this plan to go awry (not that night, at least). Watching everything fall into place is supremely satisfying, but a note of tension undercutting this sequence would have gone a long way towards building it towards something even greater. As it is, this scene alone is worthy of all the acclaim heaped onto Dassin for his direction.

A discussion held after the heist between these gangsters re-affirms the emptiness of Tony’s life. With no one to look out for, he doesn’t just lack someone — or something— to spend his earnings on, but a sense of purpose entirely. This itself presents opportunities for drama, but becomes significantly less interesting when the aftermath of the heist sees Pierre attempt to intercept the group’s winnings. From here, a standard crime film emerges, losing the distinctive flair that made Rififi so absorbing. The futility of criminal endeavours are explored, but never thoroughly enough to discern notes of moving tragedy from these developments. If all of these men were to see their loyalty against one another tested in a more meaningful sense, where one or more of the group ends up being duplicitous, it would be fascinating to witness all of their hard work and camaraderie come undone.

This is where Rififi’s legacy as an early example of a heist film hasn’t held up so well. The intervening decades since its release have led to more films being made that focus squarely on the painful futility of crime, explored through comic and tragic lenses. The Coen Brothers’ crime comedy-drama Fargo (1996), and the fascinating, multi-story TV reinterpretation of the same name, immediately come to mind as scathing indictments of the urge to throw one’s life away for a cause that will inevitably lead to ruin.

While Tony remains stoic and formidable by the end of this experience, not enough time is spent with him or the rest of this criminal posse to make us care about how willing they are to put their lives in peril. Even the film’s ending, which should be winding down towards the pitiful tragedy that rounds out this experience, rises higher and higher in momentum through its soundtrack and visuals. It insists on high-stakes tension, even when the real tragedy here is that there’s so little left to be said about these characters. But that goes unexplored in favour of a decently composed but unmoving denouement.

FRANCE | 1955 | 115 MINUTES | 1.33:1 | BLACK & WHITE | FRENCH

Cast & Crew

director: Jules Dassin.
writers: Auguste Le Breton, Jules Dassin, René Wheeler (based on the novel ‘Du Rififi chez les hommes‘ by Auguste Le Breton).
starring: Jean Servais, Carl Möhner, Robert Manuel, Jules Dassin, Magali Noël, Claude Sylvain, Marcel Lupovici & Marie Sabouret.