Les Égouts du paradis (1979)
Directed by José Giovanni

Film Review

Les Égouts du paradis recounts in meticulous detail what has been dubbed the 'hold-up of the century' - a raid on a Nice bank in 1976, by an organised gang that walked away with fifty million francs. The film is based on a novel of the same title, written by one of the participants in the crime, Albert Spaggiari, whilst on the run from justice after a daring prison escape. A British film adaptation of Spaggiari's novel was also released the same, The Great Riviera Bank Robbery (1979), directed by Francis Megahy.

The French film was directed by José Giovanni, himself a convicted criminal who, in the late 1940s, narrowly escaped being executed for premeditated murder. On his release from prison, Giovanni related his failed break-out attempt in his first novel Le Trou, which was not long after made into a film by Jacques Becker, one that marked the beginning of Giovanni's screenwriting career. Subsequently, Giovanni authored (as a writer and/or director) several notable French gangster films and policiers, including Le Clan des Siciliens (1969) and Deux hommes dans la ville (1973). Les Égouts du paradis is one of his later films - one that feels like an overt homage to Jules Dassin's classic heist movie Du rififi chez les hommes (1955), with its detailed account of a carefully planned robbery. The part of Spaggiari is convincingly played by Francis Huster, who portrays him less as the archetypal criminal and more as an ordinary man who becomes obsessed with the idea of making an easy fortune. Not quite as satisfying as some of Giovanni's earlier films, Les Égouts du paradis has a realism tinged with a distinctive lyricism that makes it resemble more a good spaghetti western than a classic French film noir.

Film Synopsis

Albert Spaggiari plans the most spectacular robbery of his career: to raid the vault of a major bank by tunnelling up from the sewers.  He recruits a team of crack professional crooks and hires the sophisticated hardware needed to pull off the heist.  The stakes are high, but so is the reward.  But for Spaggiari, this venture is much more than just about getting rich quick...