Le rideau rouge

Generally considered a Jean Anouilh work (the playwright directed two movies and would have directed three (the third one would have been "Pattes Blanches" if he had not fallen ill),"Le Rideau Rouge" is a thriller based on Shakespeare's "Macbeth".

A group of thespians are to play the famous tragedy.One of them ,a nasty old actor (Michel Simon) is slain and they have to use his understudy ;the resemblance between the two men is striking and it seems to the leads (who play Macbeth and Lady Macbeth)that the dead is not dead and asks them for an explanation.

Shakespeare's scenes are smartly integrated into the plot and give substance to what would have been a banal love triangle .Pierre Brasseur is a superb Macbeth .The French cops are ignorant and do not know anything about "Macbett "but they learn to appreciate it.Anything but derivative.