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Le Solitaire
1987 Action / Crime / Thriller
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Credits
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Director: Jacques Deray
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Script: Alphonse Boudard, Jacques Deray, Simon Michaël, Daniel Saint-Hamont
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Photo: Jean-François Robin
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Music: Danny Shogger
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Cast: Jean-Paul Belmondo (Stan Jalard),
Jean-Pierre Malo (Charly Schneider),
Michel Beaune (Le commissaire Pezzoli),
Pierre Vernier (Maurin),
François Dunoyer (René Pignon),
Franck Ayas (Christian),
Laurent Gendron (Rocky),
Jean-Claude de Goros (Boulin),
Guy Pannequin (Sumatra),
Patricia Malvoisin (Brigitte),
André Landais (Marc),
Alan Coriolan (Serge),
Carlos Sotto Mayor (Eva),
Valérie Steffen (Carole),
Bernard Freyd (Le directeur de la P.J.),
Luc-Antoine Diquéro (Eric),
Eric Denize (Aldo Benani),
Yolande Gilot (Sandra),
Henri-Jacques Huet (Un frère Carmoni),
Yves Gabrielli (Stazyk),
François Marcantoni (Louis),
Michel Creton (Simon),
Catherine Rouvel (Mia)
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Country: France
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Language: French
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Runtime: 92 min
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Aka: The Loner
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Summary
A jaundiced police commissioner, Stan Jalard, is planning to start a new life, running
a hotel in the Antilles with best friend. When his friend is shot dead almost under
his nose, Stan abandons his dream and resumes his police duties, with the sole objective
of tracking down his friend’s killer, the ruthless crook Schneider.
Review
Despite some rather awkward attempts to bring it up to date (the all-pervasive disco culture,
the viscerally realistic killings, etc.), Le Solitaire is a crime thriller in the
classic French polar mould. The simple tale of revenge and retribution which provides
the film’s plot is familiar but competently realised by Jacques Deray, with some typically
tough and charismatic performances (Belmondo and Malo are excellent) - combining all the
elements you would expect to find in the traditional polar. The original title of
the film, Cobra, was changed when Deray discovered that Sylvester Stallone was
making an extremely physical action thriller with the same title.
Prompted partly by his a major injury Belmondo sustained whilst making an earlier film,
Deray decided to minimise the use of action stunts in this film, opting instead for something
which is nearer to the psychological thriller. This is in complete contrast to Deray’s
previous Belmondo film, Le Marginal (1983), which saw the actor accomplishing some
of his most impressive stunts. Despite this, the two films have a number of
similarities, not least in the casting, and Deray promoted Le Solitaire as a sequel
to Le Marginal, even though there is nothing in the film’s narrative to link the
two films.
Although Le Solitaire is marginally the better of the two films, it was far less
successful than its predecessor. Whereas Le Marginal attracted a million
cinema-goers in Paris alone, Le Solitaire failed to match this figure in the whole
of France. This reflected a growing trend in French cinema in the late 1980s: the
traditional crime thriller was becoming increasingly unpopular in France, with many attempts
to re-invent the formula failing spectacularly at the box office. Another possible
reason for the film's unpopularity was Jean-Paul Belmondo's decision to return to his
theatre work, bringing to an end his era as the strong action hero of French cinema.
© James Travers 2001
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