Les Yeux cernés (1964)

Les Yeux cernés is a French thriller film first released in 1964, directed by Robert Hossein.  The film stars Robert Hossein, Michèle Morgan, Marie-France Pisier, François Patrice and Pascal Mazzotti.  It has also been released under the title: Marked Eyes.  Our overall rating for this film is: mediocre.


When Vollmer, the owner of a sawmill, is shot dead in a small Austrian town, there is no shortage of suspects.  Friedrich, the inspector leading the police investigation, learns that Vollmer, a tough and ruthless man, was hated by just about everyone, including his estranged wife.  Not long after her arrival in the town, Madame Vollmer begins to receive anonymous letters from someone who promises to reveal to her the identity of the killer in exchange for a large sum of money.  The widow immediately feels threatened and confides her fears in her husband’s former manager, Franz.  But, Madame Volver’s anxiety soon turns to paranoia and she becomes convinced that it is Franz who is her enemy...

In common with many of Robert Hossein’s directorial efforts, Les Yeux cernés is a film that is stylish, highly evocative of its period,  but lamentably lacking in substance.  Even with the combined acting talents of Hossein, Michèle Morgan and Marie-France Pisier, the film fails to convince, essentially because the plot is so ludicrously transparent that you have to be a comatose dimwit not to work out the identity of the killer and the blackmailer within the first ten minutes.  The film’s only real interest is the imaginative way in which it is shot and edited, which manages to convey a mood of mounting oppression and paranoia, although this would clearly have had much greater impact if more effort had gone into refining the script.

© James Travers 2009

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