Rififi

Rififi [Du rififi chez les hommes] (Criterion #115). 1955 Rialto Pictures, Gaumont & Janus Films.
Starring: Jean Servais, Carl Mohner, Robert Manuel, Jules Dassin (as Perlo Vita), Magali Noel
Director: Jules Dassin
Available at Amazon.

American filmmaker Jules Dassin found himself blacklisted in Hollywood after he made and released Night and the City. Dassin found work in France where he directed a film adaptation of Auguste le Breton's novel of the same name, writing the screenplay in English, and having a screenwriter named Rene Wheeler translate it into France. Dassin hated the novel, leaving out the racist overtones, and a scene involving necrophilia, and he instead made the heist scene, which only took up ten pages into the book, into the film's centerpiece.

The film was released in America with a dubbed soundtrack, which was included in Criterion's release, and that happens to be the one I'm watching, instead of using subtitles.

Tony le Stephanois (Servais) just got out of prison after a five year sentence, and he is asked by a friend named Jo le Suedois (Mohner) to participate in a theft of diamonds. Tony is godfather to Jo's son, but he declines to take part in the heist, only changing his mind after finding out his former lover Mado (Marie Sabouret) is now seeing another gangster, Pierre Grutter (Marcel Lupovici). Tony only agrees to take part on the condition that they not steal from the store window, but the jeweler's safe. Another gang member named Mario (Manuel) suggests that they recruit a safe cracker named Cesar (Dassin/Vita). After surveying the jewelry store, they break in from an upstairs flat and successfully pull off the theft. Cesar secretly takes a diamond ring as a gift for his mistress Viviane.

Grutter, upset over Tony's treatment of Mado, and discovering that he was part of the heist, he orders Tony and his accomplices killed. After Mario and his wife are murdered, and Cesar dies, Grutter ups the stakes by kidnapping Jo's son Tonio. It's up to Tony to save his godson once Jo finally cracks under pressure, and confronts Grutter himself.

Recommended movie.