Borsalino & Co. (1974)

Borsalino & Co. is a French thriller film first released in 1974, directed by Jacques Deray.  The film stars Alain Delon, Riccardo Cucciolla, Adolfo Lastretti, Catherine Rouvel and Reinhard Kolldehoff.  It has also been released under the title: Blood on the Streets.  Our overall rating for this film is: mediocre.


1930s Marseilles.  Having attended to the funeral of his friend, Capella, gangster king Roch Siffredi sets about trying to find his killer.   Disposing of Capella’s murderer proves to be easy, but the latter has a brother, Volpone, who in turn intends to take his revenge on Siffredi.  To that end, Volpone sets out to take control of Marseilles, killing all who get in his way.  Humiliated and discredited, Siffredi is forced to flee Marseilles.  He returns, some years later, with a new band of gangsters, and unleashes a bloody fight to death against Volpone.

It is a rare that a sequel to a popular film is anywhere near as good as the original and Borsalino and Co. proves the point with (literally) a vengeance.  The 1970 film Borsalino was quite a respectable gangster film, bearing a favourable comparison with Francis Ford Coppola’s Godfather films which appeared later in the same decade.  Its misguided sequel, however, is little more than a derivative tale in which two rival gangs spend the best part of two hours systematically slaughtering each other before our eyes.  Totally lacking in dramatic tension and characterisation, with Alain Delon at his most irritatingly complacent, this film would have little to commend it if its production values were not so damned impressive.  Even with such third rate nonsense as this, French cinema proves itself second to none in recreating an authentic period setting, with cinematography and music to die for.  Yes, the film does have some artistic strengths, but mercifully there wasn’t a Borsalino III.

© James Travers 2002

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