So much average

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

A terrific literary drama and character piece that shows how the process of creating art can be seen differently by those doing it and those looking at it from the outside.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

This Decoin effort has still got a good reputation in France.It's far from perfect though and the problem is that the screenplay hesitates between pure film noir and comedy.Besides, writer Albert Simonin is not Georges Simenon;nor is he Boileau-Narcejac or Frédéric Dard: the lines are witless and the suspense scenes almost brainless:how can we believe (and how can the head warden?)in three suicides which all take place in a prison?Five thieves steal jewels ,and,as an "alibi",burglarize a Pastis distillery: one year imprisonment . But someone is doing away with the five accomplices :and then there were two.What was possible in Lacombe's "Le Dernier des Six" -one of the men of the gang gets rid of the others to get the whole loot- is unconvincing in a jail where wardens are supposed to keep a close watch on you .You must be very gullible to believe such a story.There's an attempt at a social comment:when of the prisoners's girlfriend (Anouk Aimée) comes to visit her squeeze ,they can't say a single world in the visitors room.The gloomy atmosphere of the visitors' room does not make it a nice place to be.This is probably the best scene of the whole film.