Pour cent briques t'as plus rien

1982, France, directed by Edouard Molinaro

I'm not sure what it says about the glory days of the early Mitterrand era, but this is the third 1980s French comedy I've watched in a row in which one or more hitherto upstanding characters is rather easily persuaded to take the money and run. The idea is taken to its farcical extreme here, with the film's title giving an indication of the steep cost of Parisian living, and bank robbery the obvious solution to the problem--indeed, the solution is so obvious that everyone wants a piece of the action. This kind of thing was Daniel Auteuil's pre-Jean de Florette bread and beurre - actually, this is rather better than his 1980s average for the most part - and there are few hints of the future direction of his career; by contrast, Gérard Jugnot has ploughed a pretty consistent comic furrow in the intervening years, with occasional forays into sentimentality.