Compartiment tueurs (1965) - film review

On the night-train from Marseilles to Paris, a young woman is murdered in her sleeping compartment. Inspector Grazzi takes charge of the investigation, aided by his young assistant Jean-Lou.  They track down the passengers who took the same train and uncover a web of intrigue.  Then, one by one, the passengers are mysteriously killed…

Costa-Gavras made his directoral debut with this fast-moving, convoluted but magnificently assembled crime thriller.  The film reflects the director’s interest for American film noir and, thanks largely to an impressive cast, is one of his most entertaining films. Compartiment tueurs is certainly a far more accessible than the heavy political thrillers which would earn Costa-Gavras his reputation in the following decade.

An all-star cast (which includes several cameo appearances from popular French actors of the period) is headed by Yves Montand, who would feature strongly in a number of Costa-Gavras later political films.  Montand stars in this film with his wife, Simone Signoret, and their daughter Catherine Allégret (the daughter of Signoret’s first ill-fated marriage to director Yves Allegrét).  Although Montand’s strong screen presence dominates, the charismatic Signoret and her stunning daughter cannot help to capture our attention.

© James Travers 2000

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This is one of those films that gives serendipity a good name. Costa-Gavras had been an assistant director on one of Simone Signoret’s films and, on the strength of that acquaintance, he showed her the screenplay of Compartiment tuers, which he intended for his directing debut.  He thought she might persuade her daughter, Catherine Allégret, to accept a role in the film.  Instead, Signoret decided to take a role herself and, as a bonus, she introduced Costa-Gavras to her husband, Yves Montand, who volunteered to play the detective.  The result was a classic of its genre and the beginning of a fruitful partnership between Montand and Costa-Gavras.  An exceptional film.
Leon Nock (London, England) 2010 

Saw this film over thirty years ago on British TV. It may well be this film along with Rififi that started me watching and, for the most part, loving French crime films. Yves Montand plays the policeman investigating a series of murders which appear to have no link other than the victims travelled together in the same sleeping compartment of the train from Marseille to Paris. Pity the DVD does not appear to have English subtitles.
Steve Beardsmore (Dudley, UK) 2012

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