Like big cats
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | Like big cats |
| Original title | Les Félins |
| Country of production | France |
| original language | French , English |
| Publishing year | 1964 |
| length | 97 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | René Clément |
| script |
Pascal Jardin , René Clement , Charles Williams |
| production | Jacques Bar |
| music | Lalo Schifrin |
| camera | Henri Decaë |
| cut | Fedora Zincone |
| occupation | |
| |
Wie Big Cats (original title: Les Félins ) is a French psychological thriller from 1964. The German-language premiere took place on August 27, 1964.
action
The young French playboy Marc has an affair with the wife of a New York gang boss. When the affair is exposed, he gives his henchmen the order to liquidate Marc. In a hotel on the Côte d'Azur , Marc is tracked down and captured by the gangsters. He manages to escape through a daring maneuver in which he lets himself plunge from the cliff into the sea in his car. In dire straits, he tries to go into hiding in nearby Nice .
While feeding the poor in a church to which he has fled, he happens to meet the extremely wealthy widow Barbara and her cousin Melinda, who are mainly Samaritans here. The two women take a liking to the attractive Marc and help him to shake off his pursuers. They take him to their palazzo-like villa, where he pro forma takes on the role of chauffeur. The atmosphere there seems mysterious and ambiguous to him. Bit by bit Marc realizes that he is not the only one in the villa who has found shelter here. Barbara's lover, Vincent, killed Barbara's husband two years ago and has been wanted by the police ever since. Barbara keeps him hidden in her villa, where he lives in a secret room behind a large mirror like in a prison. Barbara looks after him, serves him his meals and meets with him for love nights in his room.
For Marc, the events in the villa are all the more threatening when he also has to realize that Barbara is also beginning to be interested in him while he is already ensnared by the seductive-lascivious Melinda. Finally, there is a final argument between Marc, Barbara and Vincent, in the course of which Barbara and Vincent are killed. Marc realizes that staying in the villa has lost all sense for him, and so he tries to manage his long-planned departure from the villa. But Melinda knows how to prevent this with feminine sophistication. On the run from the police, there seems to be nothing left for him to do but return to the villa, where Melinda hides him in the very room that Vincent had previously used as a shelter. Marc has no choice, he has to keep hiding because he is still wanted by the American gangsters and now also by the French police. Now he is completely at the mercy of Melinda and her caprices, a promising escape is out of the question at first. As a consolation, Melinda gives him a little tiger cat as a present.
background
Like Big Cats is the first feature film that American actress Jane Fonda shot in France. The film was based on the novel Joy House by Day Keene .
Reviews
“Excitingly staged, but overly constructed thriller with elements of crime and horror; Successful genre entertainment under the safe direction of an old master, ”said the lexicon of international film .
Web links
- How big cats in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- Film information, criticism, posters, photos of scenes on der-film-noir.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ Like big cats. In: Lexicon of International Films . Film service , accessed October 25, 2019 .