Watched this last night - a belting French Cops and Robbers drama set among the Paris version of the flying squad. It opens with their main informant being murdered and they need replacement to get Mr Big.
They lean on a Dede (Philippe Léotard) a small time crook and pimp and his whore/girlfriend(Nathalie Baye) to persuade them to snitch on Messina.
They use threats,beatings - in fact anything to get a result. The cops are played in a very unsympathetic light - the're really thugs who bend the law to suit their ends.
Interestingly both Dede and Nicole are are much more attractive characters - he's her pimp but he loves her as she loves him. You really care about them as they are exploited by the cops who don't care what happens to them as long as they get their villian. There are car chases and shoot-outs aplenty but its the central relationship that lifts this above your average cop movie.
All the leads are well played and you hope things will work out for Dede and Nicloe but you know life isn't like that.
Not an obvious ending either and directed with an intesity by Bob Swaim who films it almost as a documentry so real is the gritty feel of the Parisian undwerworld.
Highly reccomended.
