Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #27173 in DVD
• Brand: Kino Video
• Released on: 2005-08-16
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.66:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Letterboxed, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: French
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 112 minutes

Customer Reviews

Not bad, but no Melville
Flic Story relates the true story of a relatively honest French detective (Delon) attempting to find an escaped and very dangerous criminal (Trintignant). Almost immediately out of the mental institution, Trintignant goes on a cold-blooded killing spree, which includes the murder of a police officer. Delon's associates prefer beating up suspects to exhort confessions, but Delon prefers a softer, low key style. An obligatory subway chase scene is included.

This movie is good, but not in the same league as Melville's Le Samourai or Le Cercle Rouge. Delon is cool of course (and so is Trintignant) but Melville adds those little touches that enhance the atmosphere and add depth to the characters. I definitely recommend this film to devoted fans of French gangster films. For those not as familiar with the genre, I would try Melville's films first.

Okay policier, but could have been much better
Flic Story is an uninspired but serviceable period thriller with Alain Delon's honest cop tracking down Jean-Louis Trintignant's psychotic killer in post-war France. The true story is better than the execution, which mixes good but sparing location work with a lot of studio interiors to not always seamless effect, but it's only in the last couple of far too brief scenes where Delon and Trintignant's characters get to know each other that the film really shows what it could have been.

The letterboxed transfer is more than acceptable but less than outstanding, while the extras consist of brief stills gallery, trailer and unsubtitled trailers for 9 other Delon titles - The Sicilian Clan, Borsalino and Co, Two Men in Town, Mort d'un Pourri, Trois Hommes a Abbatre, Pour la Peau d'un Flic, Le Battant, Parole de Flic and Ne Reveilles pas un Flic Qui Dort.

Who's Cooler -- Alain Delon or Alain Delon?
Delon defines cool as a cop hunting down super-psycho gangster Trintignant in post-war Paris. You don't get the thrilling cinematic high of a Melville picture in this largely set-bound but colorful production, but it's fun and Delon is riveting. (JTL on the other hand, is such a humourless, dead-eyed, whack-job it's hard to see how he could come to lead a criminal gang that's this loyal to him.) The tense restaurant climax is terrific. (And note how the denouement resembles American Gangster.)