K (1997)

K is a French thriller film first released in 1997, directed by Alexandre Arcady.  The film is based on a novel by Guy Konopnicki and stars Patrick Bruel, Isabella Ferrari, Marthe Keller, Pinkas Braun and Jean-François Stévenin.  Our overall rating for this film is: good.


From childhood, Sam Bellamy has enjoyed the company of his chess mentor, Joseph Katz, a Jewish survivor of the Nazi holocaust.  One day, a German appears in Katz’s shop.  Recognising the man as one of his erstwhile tormenters, the Jew kills him.  Sam, a policeman, allows Katz to walk away, but it is not long before Katz’s pursuers find him.  Believing Katz to have perished in a gas explosion, Sam travels to Berlin to try to discover who would want to kill his friend.  There, he meets a young German woman, Emma Güter, a communist sympathiser who sheds some light on the mystery.  Sam is then abducted by Nora Winter, a member of an Israeli commando unit which is tracking down some missing art treasures.   As Sam pursues his investigation, he unwittingly becomes a pawn in a deadly game of international politics…

The hugely popular singer-actor Patrick Bruel gives a respectable “hard man” performance in this mix of hard-edged film noir and political thriller.  It is one of the better offerings from Alexandre Arcady, a director responsible for such trashy box office hits as Le Grand Pardon (1982).  K compares favourably with the much-loved French policiers of the late 1970s, even if it is slightly too long and has an excruciatingly complicated plot.  If the film has one irredeemable fault it is that it attempts to bring too many elements into its storyline – the connection it makes with the Gulf War appears not only contrived but unashamedly gratuitous.   This is a film which is clearly intended for an alert and intelligent spectator.  Providing you can keep up with the fast moving narrative, it manages to be an effective thriller, even if most of the main characters seldom depart from the familiar stereotypes.  The film’s most interesting character is an unscrupulous, barking mad Jew effortlessly played by Pinkas Braun; the actor should find easy work as a James Bond villain after this film.

© James Travers 2005

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