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Le Samouraï (The Godson) (1967)

tomatometer

100

Average Rating: 8.4/10
Critic Reviews: 7
Fresh: 7 | Rotten: 0

No consensus yet.

audience

94

liked it
Average Rating: 4.3/5
User Ratings: 12,279

My Rating

Movie Info

A dedicated professional killer lies fully clothed in his monochromed apartment, then goes off to a day at the office: stealing a car, killing a man in a nightclub, setting up an ironclad alibi, and outsmarting the police. Two problems: his anonymous employers don''t trust him and he''s left one witness behind, a beautiful jazz pianist.

PG, 1 hr. 40 min.

Mystery & Suspense

Oct 25, 2005

All Critics (26) | Top Critics (8) | Fresh (28) | Rotten (0) | DVD (13)

Delon's inscrutable presence adds to an unnerving atmosphere of anticipation. You feel that something bad could come crashing into the frame at any second. And you would be right.

October 8, 2009 Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune | Comment
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Top Critic IconTop Critic

[Melville's] style remains haunting and elegantly spare, just right for the kind of hit man who lives in silence, in bare and colorless surroundings, with a lonely caged bird.

May 20, 2003 Full Review Source: New York Times | Comment
New York Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

Le samourai expresses a kind of loneliness to be sure, but it's that of a teenage male dreaming about Hollywood movies and their accoutrements -- penthouse apartments, acerbic cops, melancholy city streets, smoky card games, fancy jazz nightclubs.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | Comment (1)
Chicago Reader
Top Critic IconTop Critic

One of the pleasures of Le Samourai is to realize how complicated the plot has grown, in its flat, deadpan way.

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | Comment
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic IconTop Critic

To each his own. Filmmakers as diverse as Quentin Tarantino and Paul Schrader were influenced by Melville, and Hong Kong action director John Woo calls the film 'the closest to a perfect movie that I have ever seen.'

January 1, 2000 Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | Comment
San Francisco Chronicle
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Melville is much more interested in procedures than action. The film is so stripped down that we learn as much as we need to know about Jef in the film's first 15 minutes.

January 1, 2000 Comment
Houston Chronicle
Top Critic IconTop Critic

an enjoyably stylish entry in the French crime film tradition, but a decidedly minor one

August 17, 2010 Full Review Source: Cinema Writer | Comment
Cinema Writer

A major work from a highly influential director -- Walter Hill and John Woo have both taken a lesson or two -- yet one whose films have been, until now, inexplicably neglected in the U.S.

August 29, 2006 Full Review Source: TV Guide's Movie Guide | Comment
TV Guide's Movie Guide

Melville's film had a major influence in Hollywood.

June 24, 2006 Full Review Source: Time Out | Comment

The role not surprisingly made Alain Delon a star. Despite his limited range of expressions, Delon conveys a great deal through his piercing blue eyes and the smallest bits of body language.

December 6, 2005 Full Review Source: Q Network Film Desk | Comment
Q Network Film Desk

A poised tiger navigating an urban jungle, Delon's samouraï is the epitome of noir cool.

October 24, 2005 Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | Comment
Slant Magazine

Achieves an atmosphere of mesmerizing, otherworldly beauty and grace.

October 24, 2005 Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | Comment
Slant Magazine

By far the coolest.

October 14, 2005 Full Review Source: Combustible Celluloid | Comment
Combustible Celluloid

Making films this good wasn't a principle for Melville, it was a habit.

October 13, 2005 Full Review Source: Filmcritic.com | Comment (1)
Filmcritic.com

Le Samouraï's narrative players are designed for easy interpretation. This fosters the plot's complication, as well as Melville's inimitably stylistic filmmaking

July 20, 2004 Full Review Source: Not Coming to a Theater Near You | Comment
Not Coming to a Theater Near You

The film has been a tremendous influence to the crime drama genre.

March 20, 2004 Full Review Source: Ozus' World Movie Reviews | Comment
Ozus' World Movie Reviews
More Critic Reviews

Audience Reviews for Le Samouraï (The Godson)

At his core, Melville seems to have a real passion for ice-cool crime thrillers. While Army of Shadows showcases his ability to craft really insightful pieces on the human condition, this film has Melville flexing his noir muscle. The story is thin, but the style is thick. Half of the film just seems to be the

January 12, 2012
axadntpron
Reid Volk

Super Reviewer

The film opens with a long shot of a small apartment and the background noise consists of the continuous tweeting of a bird. A man is lying on the bed, smoking a cigarette, although he isn't the focus of this frame. This shot occupies the screen for some time and throughout the appearance of the title cards. A quote

March 18, 2011
Aditya Gokhale
Aditya Gokhale

Super Reviewer

Le Samouraï (The Godson) Quotes

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Latest News for Le Samouraï (The Godson)

September 1, 2010:
John Woo Plans Le Samourai and Killer Remakes
John Woo has remakes on his mind -- two of them, in fact. As the director tells Variety, he's...

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Foreign Titles

  • Der Eiskalte Engel (DE)
  • The Godson (Le Samourai) (UK)
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