spamobile Although living in France I hardly speak it so was confined to reading subtitles. You have to see this movie in French though, it's as French as it can be. But, it's French as good as it can be. Hearing it in French makes it all the better. It's been a long time that such a good crime gangster movie was made. The realism level is amazing. If a car crashes into something else, it get's damaged, not like in your average American crime movie where the most ridiculous turns and jumps are made and they keep on driving like nothing happened. The shooting is realistic, shoot to kill but it's not that easy in all the excitement to hit something. It's the ugly truth about a live gone wrong. You start with feeling for the main character due to the circumstances but soon you'll end up on the other side, detesting his being, but that makes you all the more nailed to your seat to see what happens next. Gangster pure sang, which, of course, meets his end like it supposed to. I won't give anything away as that would take away your experience when you watch the movie, and watch it you must!

David Ferguson Greetings again from the darkness. This is part two of director Jean-Francois' tale of famed criminal Jacques Mesrine. As in part one, Vincent Cassel delivers a frightening performance of this psychopath who is addicted to the spotlight, danger, women and little else.The second film drives home the point that Mesrine was little more than an aggressive hoodlum. What I mean by that is that he was no criminal mastermind. No real strategist. He just steals when he needs money and then quickly helps the press fill in the blanks on his escapades. Watching him swell with pride as he is pronounced France's Public Enemy Number One is just plain creepy.Ludivine Sagnier (so great in "Swimming Pool") plays Sophie, his last girlfriend. Watching her reaction to her dog being shot in the final shootout tells you all you need know about her and her relationship with Mesrine.Much of this part is based on the police chases and the efforts put into "catching" Mesrine and his accomplice. His new partner in crime is played by the terrific Mathieu Amalric ("Quantum of Solace", "The Diving Bell and the Butterfly"). Amalric has the steely eyed stare that give him the chops to hang with Cassell.While I truly admire Cassell's performance in these two films and I find them extremely well made, I still feel a bit empty about the subject matter. Mesrine was a brutally violent criminal who managed 3 daring prison escapes, numerous bank robberies, kidnappings and killings. However, there is just not much depth to the man. Maybe it's true ... some people just want to see the world burn. No matter what, these two films should be seen as close together as possible. This is ONE STORY cut into two pieces. Set aside 4 hours and see the entire thing.

johnnyboyz Public Enemy Number One changes tacts in the 2009 double-bill chronicling notorious French gangster Jacques Mesrine, in that where the first was interested in detailing the rise and rise of the man, with hierarchy dominating the subject matter as well as the creating of his reputation; this edition is focused more on the tale of a gangster situated at the top of his game as well as the top of the state's hate list, hence the title, as an air of inevitability in dramatic decline begins to creep in. Cassel is back as Mesrine and playing him as the man whom ages into this somewhat grotesque, bearded, balding, overweight individual with delusions he's beaten mostly everyone up to this point and thus, is able to do mostly anything he wishes in winning any feud he instigates. The title refers to the name the state tagged onto him as Mesrine evaded capture; incarceration; thieved and terrorised to the point a 'shoot to kill' tactic had to be deployed. Since most of their primary methods were rendered futile due to the man's seeming invulnerability to being held down in a prison, a more blood thirsty tactic was forced into being deployed. As the state appear to step up their tactics and actions, Mesrine comes across as winding down as age and apparent psychological state catch up with him in that ideas of new plateaus such as politics and guerrilla warfare onto which he'll move begin to fill his head.If Killer Instinct was more to do with building a man up, this film is concerned with knocking him down; the first film allowing us to form our own opinion of him as he engaged in all this immoral activity but director Jean-François Richet refraining from painting an overly hateful image of him. When Mesrine appeared to engage in a violent act for the first time in Killer Instinct, it was against a pimp whom had beaten a woman up, rendering said fight against a sleazy; woman hating; sex industry working individual. Here, Richet drops us into an early instigation of violence as we observe Mesrine in a courthouse facing sentencing; but, and after a brief allusion to The Godfather, is soon shooting up police officers and taking a judge hostage as he escapes in what is a sequence of violence solely designed to turn us away from him as he does what he does; this, rather than paint an imbalanced portrait such as previously. Richet gradually veers us away from this figure of Mesrine, deliberately alienating us from him as the end nears, in savage beatings of hapless helpless journalists; the kidnapping and threatening of rich old men in their 80s for ransoms and a particularly gross montage right nearer the end in which Mesrine and fresh squeeze Sylvie Jeanjacquot (Sagnier) indulge in mass spending with ill-gotten money as wallowing in the purchasing of brand new cars and expensive diamonds gradually force us into turning on them.Director Richet paces this alienation wonderfully, only very gradually taking this character away from the audience before the inevitable comes to a hilt. If Killer Instinct was all about telling a story about a criminal flying all over the place and whose tales became dangerously entertaining and engaging as we wanted those around him, on several occasions, to fail in their apprehension; Public Enemy Number One is all about rendering Mesrine oafish and as if nothing more than a middle aged thug with a school playground mentality. When we begin, he's still up to his old tricks in robbing a bank before holding up another across the street for the thrill of it; in hiring a boxer he meets to act as the driver for another escapade, whom is apprehended before the plan can play out, and the consequent getaway which very nearly kills Mesrine and his second accomplice whom himself argues and walks away from Mesrine, we get the feeling the wheels are beginning to come off.Mesrine's chief criminal relationship is with another French criminal named François Besse, played by Mathieu Amalric. Besse is a quiet voice of reason amidst an inaccurate growing sense of invulnerability; the first night they break out of prison sees Mesrine bring over two women for sex and drugs, despite their faces being all over the news; whilst on another occasion, the venturing into a police station in disguise feels like a discerning act too far, and we relate to Besse as his facial expressions; tone and body language begin to mirror our own. Again, a sense of deliberate alienation creeps in on a number of occasions. The relationship hits a hilt when Besse questions Mesrine's mindset and philosophies, and the distinction between a man on a criminal ladder engaging in hierarchical struggle to that of someone veering more and more away from this life is established. Mesrine's admittance to this new existence and new found sense of life pushes him away from what it was he was in the first film, disobeying and betraying the demands of the genre; a rule breaking which costs him. While not as good as the first film detailing Mesrine's exploits, Public Enemy Number One offers an effective change of tact in covering the man's dangerous, brooding, cut and thrust life; culminating in a sequence which carries the lonesome air of inevitability as the packed, bustling Parisian streets act as the setting for the finale. As a matching set of engaging, powerhouse film-making; Richet's Mesrine double bill certainly delivers.

jotix100 Not having seen the first installment about the life of French criminal Jacques Mesrine, perhaps we are at a disadvantage. But recently, we caught the second part of the story in DVD format. The life and times of the man that was so resourceful in escaping captivity, gets a fabulous treatment at the hands of director Jean-Francois Trichet. The whole project owes a lot to the amazing performance by Vincent Cassel, not one of our favorite actors, but one has to recognize he made the whole picture enjoyable.Of course, we never even heard about the real Mesrine, but his life, the way it comes out in Abdel Raoul Dafri and the director's screen treatment is the stuff that made folk legends, much like the American gangsters in the period of the Great Depression. Unfortunately, not seeing the first part, there are things that are hard to comprehend by just watching the conclusion of the story, which is told documentary style.Vincent Cassel's take on Jacques Mesrine is what makes the viewer stay riveted to what is happening on the screen. Mr. Cassel has had his share of playing creeps before, but as Mesrines, he gives the performance of a lifetime. Mathieu Amalric appears as Francois Besse, the partner of Jacques' most daring escape from prison. Ludivigne Saigneur is seen as Silvia. Georges Wilson has a small pivotal role as the rich man Henri Lelievre, kidnapped by the two partners. Others in the large cast are the wonderful, but totally unrecognizable Oliver Gourmet, Gerard Lanvin, and Samuel Le Bihan in secondary roles.A lot of credit must be given to the amazing Robert Ganz cinematography and the careful editing by Bill Pankow and Herve Schneid. The music by Marco Beltrami and Marcus Trumpp adds a layer to the texture of the movie. One can understand the difficulty in making the film look real if one considers this is a story that happened more than thirty years ago. A lot of credit must go to the creator Jean-Francois Trichet for his achievement in recreating the story of a criminal that shook France during the time when he terrorized the country.