Pierre Collet Movies

In this French psychological drama, a bank robber is finally released after serving 10 years. His being paroled is due to the influence of his old friend, a social worker. The ex-convict returns to his wife and begins living an honest life. Unfortunately, his old crook friends begin trying to lure him back to crime. Following a prison riot, the social worker ends up living in the same town as the ex-con. They become close friends until the ex-con's wife is killed during an accident. He finds a new wife, but their happiness is marred by the cop who keeps harassing him. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Film, this is perhaps one of the best films to come out of Switzerland. The acting is effortless, the dialogue flows, and the story revolves around an office party thrown by an office drudge whom, to the surprise of his co-workers, invites them to an office party in his home--a mansion, complete with servants! What follows is a case of strangers thrown together discovering each other and is a masterpiece of understatement as the ever-patient butler tries to keep a lid on the situation. ~ Tana Hobart, All Movie Guide

In Sidney J. Furie's interminable caper film, Billy Dee Williams is a federal agent who takes matters into his own hands after the government refuses to do anything about French drug trafficking. After his daughter dies of an overdose of heroine and the authorities seem unconcerned, Nick Allen (Williams) takes it upon himself to organize a small independent task force of mercenaries to travel to France in order to kill the nine leaders of a Marseilles drug syndicate. This motley group of angry American citizens who are out for blood include the rabid Mike Willmer (Richard Pryor); the sedate Sherry Nielson (Gwen Welles); the robust Dutch Schiller (Warren Kammerling); and the kindly old Jewish couple, Ida (Janet Brandt) and Herman (Sid Melton), who want to inflict Old Testament revenge upon the dope peddlers. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

The title Life Love Death (originally La Vie, L'amour, la Mort) pretty much runs the gamut of the subject matter which normally appeals to French filmmaker Claude Lelouch. Awaiting execution for murder, Souad Amidou reflects on the events leading up to this sorry contingency. It seems that Amidou can only cohabit with prostitutes, thus he seeks out satisfaction in all the side streets of Europe. Disturbed by a whore's insults when he was unable to perform, Amidou goes completely off the deep end and begins cutting a swath of death from one end of Spain to another. Lelouch's principal stylistic decision in Life Love and Death is to draw as many parallels as possible between sex and bullfighting. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In 1944, with Paris on the verge of Liberation by the allies, Adolph Hitler ordered that the City of Light be blown up and burned to the ground. General Dietrich Von Choltitz, after much rumination, decided that he didn't want to go down in history as the man who destroyed Paris. His refusal to follow Hitler's orders would make him a pariah in Germany for the rest of his life; nor was his gesture ever rewarded by the Allies. From this very human story in the midst of one of the most inhuman conflicts in history grew the screenplay (by Gore Vidal and Francis Ford Coppola) of the all-star, internationally produced Is Paris Burning? Whereas the earlier The Longest Day was able to support a castful of celebrities and brief subplot vignettes, Is Paris Burning? seems more weighted down than weighty. Still, a modern audience will have fun playing "spot the star" throughout the film, especially when those spotted stars include the likes of Gert Frobe (as Choltitz), Jean-Paul Belmondo, Alain Delon, Kirk Douglas (as Patton), Glenn Ford (as Bradley), Yves Montand, Simone Signoret, Robert Stack, and even Anthony Perkins as a wide-eyed GI. Filmed on a gargantuan scale, Is Paris Burning? was based on a book by Larry Collins and Dominique LaPierre. The film was lensed in black and white, save for the Technicolor finale (in the original road-show prints). ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The second screen version of Octave Mirbeau's novel (originally filmed in 1946 by Jean Renoir), Diary of a Chambermaid charts the ambitions of Celestine (Jeanne Moreau), a woman who comes to work in the 1930s for a Normandy estate occupied by Monsieur Rabour (Jean Ozenne), his daughter (Francoise Lugagne), and the daughter's husband, Monsieur Montiel (Michel Piccoli). Celestine quickly learns that M. Rabour is a more or less harmless boot fetishist, his daughter a frigid woman more concerned with the family furnishings than in returning the affections of her husband, who, in turn, can't keep his hands off the servants. The gamekeeper, Joseph (Georges Geret), is a fascist who keeps his masters informed of all the doings downstairs, and the next-door neighbor (Daniel Ivernel) is a veteran who can't stand Monteil and is sharing a bed with his housekeeper. Celestine picks her way through this minefield carefully, spurning the advances of all of the men until it's convenient for her. ~ Tom Wiener, All Movie Guide

An uneven, occasionally unconvincing wartime drama by director Jean Dewewer, this story is set at the very end of World War II when the American forces are about to enter a small French town. Some German soldiers have captured a group of resistance fighters and are keeping them prisoners in the local church. Knowing full well that the Americans will arrive any day, the Germans begin to consider their imminent surrender, accepting the inevitable. In the meantime, various Frenchmen decide they should liberate their compatriots imprisoned in the church -- and everything goes wrong. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

In this drama, the hero finds himself beaten by gang members whose operation involves capturing young women and selling them as prostitute/slaves. When the hero's own fiancee ends up involved, he does everything he can to save her. Fortunately the police intervene, with guns blazing, and the day is saved. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Les Premieres Armes was one of three highly personal films directed by French screenwriter Rene Wheeler. Much of the story, concerning two young boys who are forced into becoming apprentice jockeys, was drawn from Wheeler's own bitter childhood experiences. Both despise the world of the racetrack, eventually rebelling against the cruelties of their superiors. The young actors playing the two protagonists don't seem not to be acting but to be truly living their roles. Uneven though it may be, Les Premieres Armes has a raw, unbridled power which compensates for its raggedness. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide