Dirty Hands

Chabrol just can't be bothered with mcguffins and creating suspense, that's where he differs from Alfred Hitchcock. Instead of a meticulous recreation of a social group (the rich), we are given careless expressionistic filmmaking using the repertory actors Attal and Zardi (here as buffoonish policemen) plus a name Hollywood actor (Steiger), an Italian pretty-boy (Giusti) and the greatest European actress of her time, Romy Schneider.

You know the plot's clumsy when two characters keep having to discuss it at length for the viewer's benefit. There's a murder scene using some sort of club that falls completely flat in dramatic terms. There are simply too many twists and turns for a simple adultery story to bear, so we are left to admire the gracefulness of Schneider's performance. She is a trophy wife who must start to make decisions on her own, in the absence of her husband and her lover; she must also learn to lie convincingly to suspicious detectives. The eroticism of the lovemaking on the livingroom carpet, taunting her frustrated husband is well evoked.

The interrogation before the judge is the one scene that really holds up dramatically. The impatient judge who finds the beautiful woman suspect very desirable, the eager lawyer who smells a way out for his client--fabulous acting by Jean Rochefort--and the woman herself who hardly says a word while the two men argue over her fate. The only such scene I can recall with this power is the one in Altman's The Player.

Top notch Chabrol! I was a bit worried at first as after the initial nude appearance of the delectable Romy Schneider, a rather puffy faced Rod Steiger does not look too good. His being dubbed does not help but soon enough with such a fast moving tale, any misgivings are forgotten. This twists and turns like some manic giallo and Chabrol does not take himself too seriously, even allowing us to laugh - out loud at one point, that must be a first for me in this directors films. I'm sure if analysed carefully there are plot holes but it is clever, involving and very enjoyable. It can also be taken very seriously as Schneider' s character as the only female, takes a little more than the 'male gaze' from everybody else in the film and the varying relationship between the two leads is as puzzling as the film itself.

The rare opportunity to see Romy Schneider naked in the grass already justifies itself to watch this movie directed by Claude Chabrol, I've never liked those European movies called Nouvelle Vague, whose the director came from, but this kind of suspense is amazing a true Hitchcock's movie, the plot is usual, the pretty young woman married with a rich old man finds a lover, the result is so much predicable, somehow Chabrol provides some surprises during the story, the cast are fine as Rod Steiger and Jean Rochefort, but no one exceed Romy she is sexy than never and desirable, valuable movie that took place in Saint Tropez.

I would like to give this wonderful film more than 7 points but it cannot measure up to the superb 'Helene' group of films Chabrol made during the period immediately prior to it.

Many reviews and books are rather scathing about 'Les Innocents aux mains salles', and this disregard, although understandable is largely unfounded. I must admit that the first time I watched it I found the dubbing disappointing and was a little disappointed by the rather casual approach of both director and actors. However by the third viewing a strange fascination and sense of immersion had developed, a state a lover of Chabrol's films will recognise. The deficiencies which the film has do little to detract from it's strange unearthly colour, the disturbing architecture and the 'otherness' evident in the most mundane acts and settings. Added to this it is a rather good thriller with plenty of plot twists and wrong turns.

This film, perhaps because it isn't one of Chabrol's best makes clear to me why he is such a talent. To clarify this I will point out that no other French director, new wave or otherwise interests me at all and I really think I only have a peripheral interest in film. This film is so un self conscious,playful and yet deeply sinister it makes a mockery of any serious analysis. Chabrol confounds those who attempt to analyse or compare him and this film is perhaps the best example of this, you can only enter the reality presented, experience and perhaps enjoy.