Eddie Constantine Movies
Eddie Constantine studied voice in Vienna but his career as a singer in the U.S. was unsuccessful. His wife, dancer Helene Mussel, joined the Ballets de Monte Carlo, and he followed her to Paris, where he began singing in nightclubs. Discovered by Edith Piaf, he became her protégé and intimate friend, and she helped him launch a career as a popular recording artist. His film career began in 1953, when he landed the role of a tough American private eye, Lemmy Caution, in a series of French action thrillers based on the novels of Peter Cheyney. His role as Caution culminated in Jean Luc Godard's Alphaville (1965). Constantine starred in movies of other genres, but usually maintained his basic tough-guy, heroic acting style. He is also the author of a novel, Le Proprietaire/The Godplayer. ~ All Movie Guide- 1961
Eddie Constantine is Lemmy Caution in everything but name in this French spy parody. Constantine has been assigned by Interpol to work as a double agent. Little does he know how many spies are on to this deception and how short his life expectancy has become. Italian comedian Renato Rascel is one of the principals involved, giving one an idea of the "seriousness" of the proceedings. Destination Fury is one of four 1961 films made by the very gainfully employed Mr. Constantine. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Renato Rascel, (more)
- 1961
Lead Eddie Constantine first began his stint as Lemmy, the hard-drinking, hard-fighting, womanizing American agent, back in 1951. He continues in that well-established role in this routine spy story about blackmail and state secrets. While Lemmy is relaxing on vacation, a woman is murdered and he gets involved in discovering why. It turns out that she and four other wives have been the target of blackmail. An Eastern European government is using unsavory information from the wives' pasts to force them into prying intelligence data out of their husbands -- all of whom work in government capacities in a variety of leading Western democracies. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Françoise Brion, (more)
- 1961
Popular American actor on the European scene, Eddie Constantine has a role that is slightly out of character for him. Instead of the usual, slightly ironic treatment of a tough guy out to fight gangsters, drug-runners, and other types from the demi-monde of crime, he is Charlie, a man sent up against a serious Nazi war criminal. Charlie has done well for himself but when a close friend asks him to track down the Nazi in Athens, he takes on the job -- his friend's brother was a victim of the Nazi during the war. Charlie runs into the usual resistance and soon finds that the Nazi's philosophy and arrogance have hit closer to home than what he thought. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Carla Marlier, (more)
- 1961
In this drama, an American agent for the OSS after the war, hides a large treasure in Czechoslovakia for a Nazi general. The general commits suicide before getting the jewels. The general's top aide then convinces the American to help him get them back. They enlist the aide of the general's daughter, a hooker and find the valuable stones. Later the Yankee and the hooker are double-crossed by the aide who was working with the prostitute's roomie. The roommate then kills the aide, and escapes on the Munich Express. The agent also boards the quickly moving train. He almost has his hands on the box of jewels when it slips from his fingers and falls into the rushing river below. As the cops arrive and take the roommate away, the agent and the general's daughter decide to start a new life together. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1961
Eddie Constantine stars in this routine crime meller as Jackson, a ventriloquist working in a Paris nightclub who runs into serious trouble. He is falsely accused of a murder, sent to prison, and then escapes to search for the real killer. It turns out the nightclub is a place for dealing drugs, which leads him toward the real perpetrators of the crime. Meanwhile, he finds out that a little girl has been used as a blackmail tool by the guilty gangsters to get her mother to accuse Jackson of the murder. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Francois Chaumette, (more)
- 1961
Eddie Constantine stars as Napo in this situation comedy. Napo has inherited the care of an old, run-down house from an elderly gentleman. On one of his many adventures, he secures the services of a young but experienced auto mechanic. The two proceed to build a drag strip on the property, as Napo helps the young mechanic with his education. But they both have eyes for a pretty French girl and battle for her affections while fighting some underhanded real estate developers who covet the rebuilt property. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Alexandra Stewart, (more)
- 1960
Five passengers on a seaplane find that a crash has stranded them on an island used for nuclear testing in this disaster movie. Just to get to the island, they had to endure many hardships including a hurricane, a gun-battle, shark-infested seas, and a fire on the plane. Panic ensues when the diverse group learns that in five hours, another bomb will be tested there. While the story is action-based, most of the time is spent looking at the individual characters and the way they cope. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Richard Attenborough, Anna Maria Pier Angeli, (more)
- 1960
A retired gangster leaves his life of crime and settles down on a ranch to raise bulls. The local rice farmers complain his bulls are grazing on their cash crop. When an old crime crony hides out at the ranch, trouble escalates when the fugitive makes a pass at the rancher's girlfriend. ~ Dan Pavlides, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Raymond Pellegrin, (more)
- 1960
Eddie Constantine stars as a reporter mixed up in the spy world in this routine espionage actioner by first-time director Pierre Grasset. After taking some illicit photos for a new story he is working on, Eddie (Constantine) is coerced into doing a job for the French Secret Service. There is a mole in the French missile sites who is passing on classified information, and Eddie is enlisted as bait to draw the culprit -- or culprits -- out. Along the way, he finds himself running for his life, fighting, and romancing until the final denouement. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Bernadette Lafont, (more)
- 1960
This "B"-grade spy drama features the ubiquitous Eddie Constantine as Lemmy (a favorite role), the special agent who has an unbounded capacity for Scotch and women, though not necessarily in that order. Lemmy has come to France to help the secret police track down a dangerous spy. His ability to fight himself out of any corner and charm himself out when fighting will not work comes in handy, as he and his French colleagues start to hunt down the elusive spy. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, André Luguet, (more)
- 1960
In this crime drama, a Yankee agent impersonates an ex-con and gets involved with the racketeering ring he wants to break up. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- 1959
In this crime drama, a criminal mastermind and his gang plan to rob the Bank of Belgium during the Brussels Exposition as the roof of the bank is being repaired. Included in his gang are a woman, haunted by wartime memories, who loves money, her assistant, and a man pretending to be a construction worker who will help them get in. The woman owns a floating nightclub, and when she refuses to sell it to a gangster named "The Bug" real trouble ensues for the would-be crooks. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Nadja Tiller, Robert Hossein, (more)
- 1959
The British-German Treasure of San Teresa is known by a variety of titles, including Hot Money Girl, Long Distance and Rhapsody in Blie. Perennial action hero Eddie Constantine plays an ex-OSS operative who returns to Czechoslovakia after the war. The mercenary Constantine hopes to recover a fortune in jewels that he'd hidden during the war at the behest of a German general. He is aided and abetted by Dawn Addams, the general's supposedly untrustworthy daughter. Crosses, double-crosses and triple-crosses abound before the film's ironic Treasure of Sierra Madre-like denouement. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Dawn Addams, (more)
- 1958
Starring the peripatetic Eddie Constantine as Eddie Petersen ("Hoppla Eddie"), this amusing crime parody pokes at the foibles of gangster movies. Eddie is a seaman working out of Hamburg who has been given the enviable job of watching over a group of pretty South American women. While this seems like a better assignment than putting out to sea for six months, he soon finds himself in more limited, but very hot water. One of the women may hold the key to a secret uncovered by her famous scientist-father, now deceased. He apparently discovered something cheap to power the automobile and a notorious international gang is after his invention. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Maria Sebaldt, (more)
- 1958
Eddie Constantine is "Lemmy Caution" in everything but name in Incognito. Constantine plays an American G-man named Stanley, who heads to a fictional South American dictatorship in search of a counterfeiting gang. Despite the urgency of his mission, Stanley has plenty of time to romance the local senoritas. Handled in a tongue-in-cheek fashion, Incognito often elicits as many laughs as gasps during the fight scenes. As a bonus, leading ladies Danik Patisson, Tilda Thamar and Gaby Andre (brunette, blonde and redhead, respectively) are very easy on the eyes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Danik Patisson, (more)
- 1958
The "mambo craze"of the late 1950s was hardly confined to the Western hemisphere, as proven by the French adventure flick Ces Dames Preferent le Mambo. In truth, there's not much singing or dancing in this Eddie Constantine vehicle. Instead, two-fisted Eddie gets involved with a treasure hunt in the Gulf of Mexico. Along the way, he smashes a narcotics ring, which wins him a reinstatement in the U.S. Navy. And of course, Constantine enjoys the attentions of a bevy of beautiful ladies (Veronique Zuber, Lise Bourdrin et. al.) wearing very little indeed. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Pascale Roberts, (more)
- 1958
Before Eddie Constantine became a French pop icon as the slapdash "Lemmy Caution," he played Johnny, a straightforward London taxi driver. When his new taxi is smashed and he needs a big loan, he agrees to a five-minute marriage to Malou, a naive French girl, so she can become a British citizen. As planned, the two part after the nuptials, not realizing that this has all been rigged as a recruiting scheme by Nick (Herbert Lom), the boss of a Soho prostitution ring. Malou learns of Nick's plans for her future and tries to escape but is drugged and locked up. With help from the head "girl," Vicki (Diana Dors), Johnny learns of Malou's peril, and hatches a plan to free her. This dark action thriller has a few clever twists, and Dors is gorgeous, but her fans may be disappointed at the smallness of her role. ~ Michael P. Rogers, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Diana Dors, (more)
- 1957
Eddie Constantine is the two-fisted star of Le Grand Bluff. Cast in a more sympathetic role than usual, Constantine plays a good-natured con artist who promotes a phony oil well. Imagine his surprise when the well yields a valuable gusher (this same plot device was utilized by Olsen and Johnson in the 1937 Hollywood comedy Country Gentlemen). Turning over a new leaf, our hero defends the well's stockholders against a criminal cartel. The story affords plenty of opportunities for Eddie Constantine to punch out the bad guys -- and to be punched out in turn. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Dominique Wilms, (more)
- 1957
Eddie Constantine stars as Bob, an American GI at large in Paris. After attending a performance of the fabled Folies-Bergere, Bob becomes convinced that one of the dancers, a feisty little number named Claudia (Zizi Jeanmaire), has stolen his wallet. When he confronts her with this accusation, she reacts in predictably volatile fashion--and before either one of them quite knows what has happened, Bob and Claudia are married! The remaining reels of Folies-Bergere chart the turbulent course of the marriage, as Bob becomes jealous that so many males get to see so much of Claudia on a nightly basis. Despite its come-hither title, Folies-Bergere is about as racy as a seed catalogue. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Zizi Jeanmaire, (more)
- 1956
Vous Pigez! (You Get It!) stars Eddie Constantine in his standard guise of hard-boiled American G-man Lemmy Caution. The plot is the usual melange of intrigue, double-crosses and impossibly beautiful women. The delectable damsels in this outing include the toothsome Maria Frau, Nadine Tallier and Irene Tunc. The villainy is in the capable hands of Roger Hanin, who went on to spy-flick fame of his own as "The Tiger." Though Vous Pigez! was the seventh of the "Caution" series, it was held back from release in the U.S. until a few of the later entries made the rounds. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Roger Hanin, (more)
- 1956
The "man" is Eddie Constantine; the "child" is Eddie's adopted daughter. The girl is kidnapped by a desperate man who is searching for his own granddaughter. If Constantine wants to see his child again, he'd better locate the missing woman. All he knows is that his quarry formerly worked in a perfume factory that served as a front for drug smugglers. Filmed in 1957, Man and Child (L'Homme et L'Enfant) was given its American release in 1964. Curiously, the film is not listed in most of the standard resumes of its stars Eddie Constantine and Juliette Greco. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Juliette Greco, (more)
- 1956
The FBI is on the trail of a missing Italian scientist and his diamond formula. ~ All Movie Guide
- 1956
Eddie Constantine found a little time between his "Lemmy Caution" actioners to star in the tongue-in-cheek meller Les Truands (The Thieves). In flashback, the audience learns why 104-year-old Amedee (Yves Robert) steals the watch belonging to the town mayor just before expiring. The film develops into a history of the watch-thievery business, told in anecdotal fashion. Constantine plays a Wild West timepiece-rustler who develops a sense of morality which puts him out of business; others in the cast include Noel-Noel as a bemused burglar and Jean Richard as an amorous crook. Les Truands was directed by Carlo-Rim with the same breeziness that he invested in his Fernandel comedies. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Eddie Constantine, Noël-Noël, (more)
