Coup de Torchon

Coup de Torchon [Clean Slate] (Criterion #106).
1981 Janus Films & StudioCanal.
Starring: Philippe Noiret, Isabelle Huppert, Stéphane Audran, Jean-Pierre Marielle, Eddy Mitchell, Guy Marchand, Irene Skobline
Director: Bertrand Tavernier
Available at Amazon.

Coup de Torchon, or Clean Slate (English title) is Bertrand Tavernier's 1981 film adaptation of pulp novelist Jim Thompson's 1964 novel Pop. 1280. For the most part, it is a faithful translation to the screen, with one notable change: the story's setting has been moved from the American southwest to colonial French West Africa (Senegal to be precise) just before World War II breaks out.

Philippe Noiret is Lucien Cordier, the hapless, but well meaning police chief of a small outpost called Bourkasa. Lucien is frequently abused by two local pimps, but he good-naturedly accepts this. Meanwhile, his officers have no respect for him, and the townsfolk have to beg him to actually do something (Lucien is also easy to bribe). At home, things aren't much better. His wife Huguette (Audran) frequently shrugs off Lucien's sexual advances, and openly engages in an affair with a man who she claims is her brother (Mitchell). Lucien just happens to be having an affair with another woman, the ditzy Rose (Huppert), while also pursuing a newly arrived school teacher named Anne (Skobline).

One night, without warning, Lucien embarks on a very nonchalant killing spree, starting with the two pimps who have been hassling him, and lying about what really happened to them. Lucien's passive, almost clownish public image works to his advantage for once, as no one would ever suspect he was the one killing people who offended or humiliated him. He realizes this, and justifies his homicidal behavior as simply wiping the proverbial slate clean.

This movie was a shock. I didn't expect this to be any kind of comedy when I picked it up from Borders as a blind buy a long time ago, but I was pleasantly surprised. Despite its violent and dark turn when Lucien embarks on his murder spree, Coup de Torchon is quite a funny film, since it's trying very hard to be lighthearted about such dark and disturbing subject matter. Noiret's performance was absolutely amazing. Highly, highly recommended.