Many European crime films didn’t get a wide release in the United States, partly because of censorship: French films were too adult and realistic for our Production code. Some were delayed for years, even just to see the inside of art houses. A few still known by their original French titles are among the best of the best: Rififi, Touchez pas au Grisbi and this intense thriller, Classe Tous Risques. It made its DVD debut in 2008 but only now has it been given an upgrade, directly to 4K Ultra HD with a Blu-ray chaser.
As directed by Claude Sautet, the film is unusually realistic and unsentimental. The tough characterizations and personal codes of honor operate separately from American noir influences. Sautet was a busy film writer, often collaborating with novelist Jean Redon. He directed more romances than crime thrillers, but his thriller output is choice. He and Redon adapted a Boileau-Narcejac novel to write Georges Franju’s Eyes without a Face.
The taut 1960 thriller follows a career criminal on the run, struggling to keep his family together. Wanted for capital crimes back home, Parisian hood Abel Davos (Lino Ventura) has been living in Italy with his wife Therese (Simone France) and their two small boys. Deciding that a return to Paris is their best option, Davos and his partner Raymond (Stan Krol) carry out a complicated plan to sneak back across the border, but all goes wrong on a deserted French beach. Alone with his boys, Davos calls his old buddies in Paris for help. As Abel suspects, his former comrades see little benefit in going out on a limb for him. Instead of assuming the risk themselves, the racketeers send a stranger to fetch Davos, young thief Eric Stark (Jean-Paul Belmondo). Stark sneaks Davos north in an ambulance, enlisting the aid of a girl he meets on the road, Liliane (Sandra Milo of Otto e mezzo). Once in Paris, Davos provides for his young boys and hides out, wondering what his next move should be.
1960 was a good year for José Giovanni, an ex-criminal who spent time on death row before becoming a novelist. Jacques Becker directed the acclaimed Le trou based on Giovanni’s experience attempting to break out of a French prison. Although the gangsters of Classe tous risques are fictional, we sense the authenticity in their behaviors. Lino Ventura, the most consistent icon in gritty French thrillers, presents Abel Davos as a man running out of time, friends and options. Davos’ notoriety is such that his friends can’t see the percentage in helping him — the flics know his associates and watch them all carefully.
The movie begins with Abel’s wife and two boys waiting in a train station. As soon as his family is en route to the north, Abel and his partner Raymond pull off a daring midday holdup on a crowded sidewalk, escaping with a banker’s satchel of money. Sautet stages some of his action scenes amid ordinary people on the street, and makes good use of cars and boats to show Davos evading roadblocks and French customs police. He’s a thief and a murderer, but we can’t help but take his side. His boys don’t know what’s going on, but they trust him in everything. He instructs them to walk ten paces behind him at all times, and to walk away if they should see him surrounded by a group of men. The boys have no idea how desperate the situation is.
Davos is soon joined by Jean-Paul Belmondo’s Eric Stark, a cool customer who openly admits to his new girlfriend that he’s a thief. She’s intrigued anyway. Like Davos, Stark can take care of himself when trouble arises. He’s forthright, loyal and likes kids, which makes an interesting contrast with Belmondo’s hipster character in Godard’s Breathless, released not long before. These French crooks have a keen appreciation for professional finesse, and Davos and Stark form an immediate bond.
Not so Abel’s old partners in Paris. Both have gained position and property that they’d rather not risk for Davos’ sake. Davos reminds them that they literally owe him their lives — he took a bad rap for one of them — an appeal that does no good. Davos was at one time the ruling prince of the Paris underworld. Now he must hide out in a maid’s room in Eric’s apartment building. Forced to literally give his boys away to trusted friends, his only new acquaintance is a sweet, innocent maid (Betty Schneider of Paris Belongs to Us).
In a way, Davos seals his own fate. To provide some money for his children, he robs a fence (Marcel Dalio), with the excuse that he’s brought the man millions in profits over the years. When his old partners unite against him, Davos shows his mettle by outwitting each of them in turn. But he can’t avoid the feeling that his efforts are pointless. He’s lost his family and his actions are doing harm to people he cares about.
Criminal Hopelessness with a positive spin: Annihilation Chic.
Classe tous risques succeeds at all levels. The police manhunt story is clever and original. One criminal loses the love of his life while another finds what seems a perfect girl. Eric Stark thought he was through with women but Sandra Milo’s beautiful Liliane accepts him for what he is. As the police close in, Davos goes into action one more time. Eric does what he can to help.
Claude Sautet covers all of this in a quiet, matter-of-fact style. Classe tous risques takes place in ordinary rooms and city streets as opposed to the nightclubs and other exotic locales usually associated with crime pictures. Its characters are vulnerable and de-romanticized, as seen in the contrast between Jean Gabin’s cultured hood in Touchez pas au grisbi and Lino Ventura’s demoralized Abel Davos. Gabin represented a romantic tradition of French masculinity, while poor Ventura is just an unlucky guy who knows he’s playing a losing game. The film’s true conclusion arrives when Davos realizes, without remorse, that his struggle is finished.
Still waiting for Criterion to give some love to ‘Three Tough Guys’ (1974)!