Jean-Pierre Melville: Le cercle rouge (Take I)

Jean-Pierre Melville's Le cercle rouge (1970) comes from a point in time two decades after Les enfants terribles, and it's in color. With it, Melville delivers a meticulous mix of crime drama, film noir and neo-noir (depending on your lingo preferences).

It's a real cool film that moves in no particular hurry. 

Early on I started thinking "Sergio Leone," and then it hit me -- the character Vogel is played by Gian Maria Volonté, the same dude that plays Ramón Rojo in Per un pugno di dollari / A Fistful of Dollars (1964) and El Indio in Per qualche dollaro in più / For a Few Dollars More (1965).  

Synchronicities. In the final season of Dexter on Showtime, the new main character, played by Charlotte Rampling, is also named Vogel.

In tonight's season opener of Dexter, a dude is trying to figure out how to "fence" jewely he robbed from a mob-owned jewelry store, while sleeping with Deb, who is on hiatus from the police force.

In Le cercle rouge, a guy is hiding from mobsters while plotting to rob a jewelry store and fence the loot, along with Vogel, who is on the lam from the police.

In tonight's series opener for Ray Donovan also on Showtime, an opening scene has Mickey (Jon Voight) emerging from prison, ready for mischief. In Le cercle rouge, an opening scene has Corey (Alain Delon) emerging from prison, ready for mischief.

Worth noting, even if it means nothing other than that crime tropes repeat themselves across the decades.

Also in Le cercle rouge are two actors who played key roles in Costa-Gavras' Z (1968/1969) the greatest political thriller flick of the 20th century (so far as I have seen): Yves Montand (as Jansen, an alcoholic ex-police sharpshooter in Le cercle rouge) and François Périer (as Santi, a mob-connected club owner in Le cercle rouge). 

Finally, André Bourvil plays Le Commissaire Mattei with gravitas and extra decency, probably because in real life he was dying, and this was his last film. 

Today's Rune: Warrior.