Lucky Jo

Eddie Constantine was a phenomenon, of Russian ancestry, a singer educated in Vienna, American citizen but better at French than English, making his career in Paris, first as a singer, then as perhaps the most hard-boiled noir actor of all. This film is more positively entertaining than noir, there are some hilarious fighting scenes, in the last one an entire restaurant is demolished by obstinate hoodlums knocking Eddie about but getting more knocked out themselves, and the story is actually ingenious. It starts with four gangsters doing a series of robberies that fail, one after the other, always followed by three of them waiting for the fourth to come out of jail, to then start all over again, organizing the next job. The last time Eddie comes ut, there is no one to meet him, and he learns, that the others have tired of, what they term, the bad luck he brings. Instead there are other gangsters doing jobs in this way, and he finds himself collecting their bodies. Several dames are involved, it seems to get really serious, but Pierre Brasseur as the police inspector knows and understands his Eddie. It is a very interesting and underrated film, and Eddie Constantine is one of those actors whose mere name in the cast ensures a film worth watching.