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Ni pour, ni contre (bien au contraire)

meg | santa monica, california | 02/22/2008

(4 out of 5 stars)

"When a winsome young tv camerawoman becomes something like the adopted pet of a crew of charismatic Parisian criminals, she adopts a hard edge of her own.

Director Klapisch gives us a honeymoon period with the gang -- they even go on vacation together -- allowing us to understand the dynamics as the group reluctantly gets persuaded to pull off "the" big score. You know, the one where everyone gets to retire afterward.

Everybody who truly loves heist or crime films must feel the same sort of satisfaction in the inevitability of fate that the ancient Greeks enjoyed in their dramas. Our heroine even explains to us when she first joins the gang that she can clearly see two paths ahead of her -- "a road to good, and a road to evil. I decided evil was better."

I have enjoyed Klapisch's romances (Chacun cherche son chat) and dramedies (Un air de famille) in the past, and I liked this foray by the director into yet another genre he admires. You can see small tips of his hat to crime film masters throughout the film -- among them Jules Dassin (Rififi), Jean-Pierre Melville (Le Samourai), and Michael Mann (Heat).

I can recommend that genre aficionados give themselves up to a leisurely arrival time of "the action," and that fans of L'Auberge espagnole not expect another cheery youth picture."