L'Indic (1983)
Directed by Serge Leroy

Film Review

After a distinguished career as a police inspector at the Sûreté nationale, Roger Borniche achieved further notoriety with a series of crime novels closely based on his professional experiences.  Their release coincided with a massive surge in the popularity of the crime-thriller (policier) genre in French cinema, so it's no surprise that many of them were turned into movies within months of hitting the bookstands.  Of these, Flic Story (1975) and René la Canne (1976) are the most memorable Borniche adaptations, two of the slickest crime movies of the decade, distinguished by their gritty realism and seductively stylish production values.

L'Indic is by far the least satisfying screen adaptation of a Borniche novel, although it was helmed by a director, Serge Leroy, who had an impressive track record in the thriller genre.  Leroy had garnered acclaim for his earlier thrillers - La Traque (1975), Les Passagers (1977), Attention, les enfants regardent (1978) - which brought a fresh and distinctive edge to the modern crime movie, with an accompanying sense of menace that was both chilling and strangely alluring.  L'Indic, by contrast, is a bog-standard, policier that shows depressingly little of its director's innovative flair.  It abounds with the glum complacency that settled on the thriller genre and hastened its demise in the mid-to-late 1980s.

A lacklustre script (marred by wafer-thin characterisation and an off-putting surfeit of clichés) would have dampened the efforts of the best of casts, but inflict this on a mediocre cast and the results were unlikely to be impressive.  It was perhaps brave of Leroy to cast two relatively unknown actors who were both better known for comedy in the principal roles, but, thanks mainly to the weak screenwriting, both actors seriously come a cropper and fail to distinguish themselves.

Daniel Auteuil (known at the time for such facile comedies as Les Sous doués) looks painfully uncomfortable in the role of a redoubtable and scheming police inspector (Bruno Cremer would have been an infinitely better choice), and there is precious little sign that the actor would go on to much better things in the course of the decade (which he did, after his breakthrough performance in Claude Berri's Jean de Florette).

Thierry Lhermitte was a more experienced actor with a higher profile, thanks to his association with the comedy troupe L'Équipe du splendid and their hit films such as Les Bronzés (1978).  Lhermitte was, like Auteuil, more at home in comedic roles and rarely convinced in straight dramatic parts, unless he was served by a good script and a reasonably competent director.  As a hardened criminal he is totally unconvincing and he fails to engage either our sympathies or our attention.

Pascale Rocard barely has enough screen presence to be noticeable, and the rest of the cast are just as indistinguishable - just ill-defined shadows in a hazy narrative that lazily drifts along like a stray dinghy on the open seas.  To be fair, L'Indic doesn't quite plumb the depths that the French policier descended to in the 1980s but neither is it particularly memorable.  It's just a routine crime drama suffering from an extremely bad case of anaemia.

Film Synopsis

From the moment he sees Sylvia for the first time Dominique Leonelli cannot take his eyes off her.  She is mourning at the funeral of an aunt.  He is powerfully drawn to her and invites her to dine with him.  He passes himself off as a businessman, whereas in fact he belongs to a ruthless crime syndicate and is the right-hand man of the Corsican gangster boss Ange Malaggione.  For some time, Inspector Bertrand has been working to smash Malaggione's criminal network and by gaining Sylvia's confidence he sees a golden opportunity to do just that.

After explaining to Sylvia that her seemingly respectable boyfriend is in the pay of a master criminal, Bertrand tries to persuade her that she should become his informer.  The young woman isn't convinced and, ignoring the danger to herself, she continues seeing Dominique, hoping that she can convince him that he should give up his life of crime.  Bertrand is not a man who can be thwarted so easily.  With or without her agreement, he intends using Sylvia to betray her boyfriend, regardless of the consequences for either of them...