Le Rendez-vous (1961)

Le Rendez-vous is a French crime film first released in 1961, directed by Jean Delannoy.  The film stars Pascal Bressy, Marie-Claude Breton, Annie Girardot, Elsa Maltzer and Philippe Noiret.  It has also been released under the title: Rendezvous.  Our overall rating for this film is: mediocre.


When photographer Daniel Marchand is shot dead, the finger of suspicion points immediately to two women -  Edith, the daughter of the oil baron John Kellerman, and Madeleine, the ex-wife of Edith’s husband, Pierre Larivière.   A third suspect is Daphné, Kellerman’s other daughter, who allowed Marchand to take lewd photographs of her shortly before his death.  To protect his family’s reputation, Kellerman compels Pierre to provide an alibi for Daphné, even though he was with Madeleine on the night of the killing.  Just who did kill Daniel Marchand – and why?

Agatha Christie meets Dallas in this convoluted soap whodunnit which, despite its impressive cast, is not one of Jean Delannoy’s best films.  As a publicity stunt, producer Robert Dorfman arranged a special screening just before the film’s official première to which he invited several lawyers, policemen and writers of detective fiction (including Albert Simonin and José Giovanni).  The film’s projection was halted just before the denouement and the guests were invited to suggest who might be the killer.   Needless to say, there was a distinct lack of unanimity in the responses...


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