Le Dossier 51 [Dossier 51] **** (1978, François Marthouret, Claude Marcault, Philippe Rouleau) – Classic Movie Review 12,697

Director Michel Deville’s disturbing, unsettling 1978 French surveillance crime drama film Le Dossier 51 is an intense and compelling experience, cleverly handled, and full of intrigue and suspense.

François Marthouret plays meticulous and honourable French diplomat Dominique Auphal, married to Liliane Auphal (Claude Marcault), who is put under surveillance in an elaborate clandestine operation by a French intelligence agency seeking to find any vulnerabilities in his private life to break him and control him politically.

The secret service give Auphal the code name 51, and they intricately spy on and analyse his private life, and then they send agents in to intervene, interview and manipulate him and his circle. Finally they seek to confront him with the truths they have found out.

Director Michel Deville handles it in masterly style, and co-writes the screenplay with Gilles Perrault, based on his novel. There is nothing conventional about Deville’s film-making style here. It’s fascinating to see the intimate details of high tech surveillance equipment and personnel of the era.

It won the 1979 Césars for Best Screenplay, Original or Adaptation and Best Editing (Meilleur montage) Raymonde Guyot. The editing must have been a nightmare, so great job there. The French Syndicate of Cinema Critics gave it their 1979 Best Film Award.

’51 is him, is us, is you’

Release date: August 30, 1978 (France). It is distributed by Gaumont.

It is a France-Germany co-production.

Runtime: 108 minutes.

It has been digitally restored  by the Éclair laboratory.

French film director and screenwriter Michel Deville died on 16 February 2023, at the age of 91. He is celebrated for Benjamin, La Lectrice [The Reader], Deep Water [Eaux profondes] and Death in a French Garden.

French writer and journalist Gilles Perrault died on 3 August 2023, at the age of 92.

© Derek Winnert 2023 – Classic Movie Review 12,697

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