Cinq tulipes rouges (1949)
Directed by Jean Stelli

Film Review

On the face of it, an Agatha Christie-style murder mystery centred on the Tour de France sounds like a brilliant idea, but tragically the film that takes up this promising concept fails to be much more than a stuttering timewaster.  Cinq tulipes rouges (adapted from a stage play by Marcel Rivet) had the potential to be a gripping and highly unusual whodunit, but with Jean Stelli directing it was bound to end up as just another plodding crowdpleaser, of the kind he seemed to specialise in.  During the Occupation, Stelli had a massive hit with the excruciating weepy Le Voile bleu (1942), and only very rarely did he rise above this level of sublime insipidity in his subsequent years.  Given Stelli's reputation for wrecking potentially good films, it's surprising that Cinq tulipes rouges is as watchable as it is.  The appeal of la Grande Boucle is at least partly to blame for this.

In addition to the well-photographed location sequences depicting the Tour (which show that the tournament was as popular and hotly contested in 1948 as it is today), the film's main saving grace is the pairing up of Suzanne Dehelly and Jean Brochard as the unlikely duo that manage to solve the murder mystery (four corpses have to pile up before they can finally unveil the killer, so they're hardly in the league of Miss Marple).  There's a weird animal magnetism between the fearsome Dehelly and the easily cowed Brochard, and this provides the film with its badly needed lighter moments, the highpoint being a cheeky homage to the classic bedroom scene in Capra's It Happened One Night (1934).  As he tentatively crawls into his bed, which is separated from Dehelly's by a mere dressing screen, Brochard gives a good impression of a man who expects to be eaten alive in his sleep.

Raymond Bussières and his real-life wife Annette Poivre help to bring the film back to earth, but alas their efforts are for nothing as lead actor René Dary ends up sending the whole thing into orbit with a final bout of histrionics that make him resemble an explosion in a ham processing factory.  Cinq tulipes rouges may spare us the soul-crushing tedium of Stelli's earlier cinematic atrocities but it's hardly a classic.  A choppy narrative and some incredibly bad acting make this an uncomfortable ride down a very twisted road, with barely a fraction of the excitement and entertainment value afforded by France's best-known sporting event.  A nice idea - completely wasted.

Film Synopsis

The 1948 Tour de France gets off to an ominous start when one of the competitors is killed in a road accident even before the competition gets under way.  Disaster strikes a second time when another cyclist, the one wearing the yellow jersey, collapses and dies at the end of the first stage.  Two deaths, two accidents - or so it seems.  When a third cyclist dies, plunging to his death as his bike goes off a mountain road, it is apparent that foul play is involved.  The likely suspect is the cyclist Albert Jacquin, who was not only on bad terms with the third casualty of this seemingly cursed competition, he also had the opportunity to tamper with his bike.

Chief inspector Honoré Ricoul takes Jacquin in for questioning but is unconvinced of his guilt.  Despite his aggressive behaviour, Jacquin is just not the type to commit cold-blooded murder.  Meanwhile, a sports journalist nicknamed Colonelle has begun her own investigation, and is intrigued by the fact that each of the three victims received a red tulip just before his death.  When a red tulip is delivered to Pierre Lusanne, the manager of the French team, Ricoul and Colonelle fear for his safety.  Lusanne will surely be the killer's next victim...