In the early 1970s, Jacques Deray reunited the two most popular French actors of the period, Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo, in Borsalino. The film follows François Capella and Roch Siffredi, two mobsters hoping to become big shots in the Marseilles mafia in the 1930s.
Borsalino was a project close to Delon’s heart, since it was he himself who suggested that Deray adapt journalist Eugène Saccomano’s collection of short stories. Such was Borsalino’s popularity that it was nominated for a Golden Globe for best foreign film in 1971.
The Red Circle (1970)
With Jean-Pierre Melville, Delon shot some of the darkest thrillers in French cinema. Le Cercle Rouge is one of them: In it, Delon again plays a crook, Corey, just out of prison and already prepared to embark on a heist at a jewelry store on the Place Vendôme. The operation must be meticulously planned to avoid arousing the suspicions of the police—but Commissaire Mattei (played by Bourvil) is already on the trail of one of Corey’s fellow robbers, Vogel, who escaped during a convoy from Marseille to Paris. A breathtaking classic.
