Symphonie pour un massacre (1963)
Directed by Jacques Deray

Film Review

After his well-recieved psychological drama Le Gigolo and crime-thriller Rififi à Tokyo, film director Jacques Deray presented Symphonie pour un massacre, his third film, on 2 August 1963.  This Franco-Italian production is based on a book by Alain Reynaud-Fourton.  The screenplay was adapted by Deray, in collaboration with filmmaker Claude Sautet and writer-actor José Giovanni.  This well-paced gangster film has an unexpected ending and paves the way for the modern crime drama, a close cousin of the Rififi films that is both classy and interesting. 

In this story about five drugs dealers who are thwarted by one of the participants, the viewer will learn that love and money are the root of all evil, and that honour is not always an option among thieves. The film's main fascination is its taut, well-constricted heist, while the melodramatic mood is heightened by some brisk action. 

Jacques Deray's cast includes several familiar faces from crime films of this period.  Michel Auclair, Claude Dauphin, José Giovanni and Charles Vanel (already used by Deray in Rififi à Tokyo) look their parts in a suitably furtive style.  Jean Rochefort is cast against type as a genuinely sinister character, definitely not the kind of role he is known for.  The future Angélique, Michèle Mercier, and Italian actress Daniela Rocca, revealed in Pietro Germi's Divorce à l'italienne (1961) provide the decorative feminine touch in this hard man's world.

Film Synopsis

Paoli, Clavet, Jabeke and Valoti run a gambling club which is, in truth, a cover for their illicit activities.  Repellini, a notorious Marseilles gangster, offers to sell them a large quantity of drugs, which they can sell for twice the price he is asking.   The offer is too good to turn down and the plan is that Moreau, the fifth member of the gang, will travel from Paris to Marseilles by train with a suitcase full of cash to buy the drugs.     However, Jabeke wants the money for himself, so he takes the same train, kills Moreu and returns to Paris with the suitcase.  A roller coaster of suspicion, betrayal and death quickly ensures...