Classic film noir. The critic Roger Ebert lists it in his Greatest Movies. François Truffaut called Rififi the best film noir he had ever seen (it is based, he added, on the worst novel he had ever read). Dassin's inspiration was the safecracking scene, negligible in the book, but extended into a long breathless sequence played entirely without words or music. The presentation was so meticulous and detailed that supposedly the Paris police wanted to ban the film because they feared it was an education for criminals. 

The combination of tight dialogue with strong characterisation that drives the plot carries the signature of Classic American Noir but the loving portrayal of 1950's Paris and a rich cinematography evoking a vivid underworld governed by its code of honour gives it a special Gallic flavour. Key to this masterly fusion may be that it's Director Jules Dassin was a Connecticut resident forced to flee to Europe to escape the McCarthy witch hunts.  Surely one of European cinema's great gains.

Director:Jules Dassin  Writer:Jules Dassin   Original title:Du rififi chez les hommes  Cast:Jean Servais, Carl Mohner, Robert Manuel, Jules Dassin, Magali Noel, Marcel Lupovici  France 1955  

Full £5 concession £3.50 2013 Membership £1

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