Exotic Crimes
Today's review: Pépé le Moko.
Pépé le Moko was a movie I’d heard of before, but didn’t know much about. Therefore, I didn’t have any expectations when I sat down to watch it. This was probably for the best, because I get the impression this movie is generally well-regarded, and I think I would have been let down if I was more familiar with its reputation.
The movie is set in Algiers, and more specifically in a labyrinthine area known as the Casbah, the place where criminals and undesirables live. The king of this region is Pépé le Moko (Jean Gabin), a French thief who fled France and now runs a small gang out of the Casbah. He’s beloved by pretty much everyone in the Casbah and even has a certain amount of respect among the police, in particular a cop named Slimane (Lucas Gridoux), who often banters with Pépé about how he’s going to catch Pépé when the time is right. Despite his status and reputation, Pépé knows the only reason he hasn’t been caught is because of the design of the Casbah, and chafes at being effectively trapped there, longing for the culture and grace of Paris. And when a Frenchwoman named Gaby (Mireille Balin) arrives and expresses an interest in him, it proves to be just what he’s looking for. The downside is, not only does that anger his mistress, Inès (Line Noro), but it could be just the opening Slimane was looking for.
It has to be said that there are a lot of great ideas in this movie. The nature of the Casbah could make it a character in its own right. Pépé being trapped in the Casbah and having to direct his affairs from a distance while taking advantage of the inhabitants respect for him offers up a lot of interesting ideas for heist scenes or showing Pépé as the best sort of “pulling all the strings” type of character. An early scene has an officer from France frustrated that the Algerian police haven’t caught Pépé yet, whereupon Slimane and the rest of the force explain that things aren’t the same here as they are in Europe-you could use that for scenes of culture clash, or the officer gradually learning to work with these new ways. Similarly, the almost friendship between Slimane and Pépé really could go somewhere, especially since Slimane almost feels like a proto-Columbo, a man who plays at being lazy but who is really waiting for just the right moment to strike. All of this, plus some interesting supporting characters in Pépé’s gang and a great tension filled scene revolving around a failed attempt to lure Pépé out of the Casbah, has the potential to be a movie I would have loved. Instead, almost all of these elements are squandered.
By the midway point of the movie, it’s clear that the thing the story really wants to focus on is the love triangle between Pépé, Gaby, and Inès. While there are still some decent moments that come from that, focusing on a romance when you have all these other ideas you could work with feels cliché, especially since that wasn’t what it initially looked like the movie was going to be about. Furthermore, the movie gets more and more melodramatic as we near the end, culminating in an ending that feels exactly like the sort of thing you’d expect from a stereotypical old European movie. The whole thing ends up feeling like the worst sort of combination of a melodrama and an art film, and left me very disappointed. I will acknowledge that Gabin gives a good performance, but I think both he and Pépé as a character deserved a better movie to work with.
If you’re looking for a good crime story or are under the impression this is one of those movies you need to see if you’re serious about film, I don’t think this is worth seeking out. On the other hand, if you’re looking for ideas for stories, I’d give this one a look. I’m pretty sure you could get three or four different movies out of the material tossed away here. Perhaps this is one of those rare cases where a remake might be in order…
CAT ALERT: Cats get two separate appearances in this movie, though neither of them are overly exciting. The first is during a montage to show the cramped, squalid nature of the Casbah, where we see a cat running away with something in its mouth. A while later, when Pépé is hanging out with Inès, we see a cat sitting by her side. We never see it again, but I’m always glad to see cats deployed to add some color. As long as it doesn’t end badly for them, of course.
Pépé le Moko was a movie I’d heard of before, but didn’t know much about. Therefore, I didn’t have any expectations when I sat down to watch it. This was probably for the best, because I get the impression this movie is generally well-regarded, and I think I would have been let down if I was more familiar with its reputation.
The movie is set in Algiers, and more specifically in a labyrinthine area known as the Casbah, the place where criminals and undesirables live. The king of this region is Pépé le Moko (Jean Gabin), a French thief who fled France and now runs a small gang out of the Casbah. He’s beloved by pretty much everyone in the Casbah and even has a certain amount of respect among the police, in particular a cop named Slimane (Lucas Gridoux), who often banters with Pépé about how he’s going to catch Pépé when the time is right. Despite his status and reputation, Pépé knows the only reason he hasn’t been caught is because of the design of the Casbah, and chafes at being effectively trapped there, longing for the culture and grace of Paris. And when a Frenchwoman named Gaby (Mireille Balin) arrives and expresses an interest in him, it proves to be just what he’s looking for. The downside is, not only does that anger his mistress, Inès (Line Noro), but it could be just the opening Slimane was looking for.
It has to be said that there are a lot of great ideas in this movie. The nature of the Casbah could make it a character in its own right. Pépé being trapped in the Casbah and having to direct his affairs from a distance while taking advantage of the inhabitants respect for him offers up a lot of interesting ideas for heist scenes or showing Pépé as the best sort of “pulling all the strings” type of character. An early scene has an officer from France frustrated that the Algerian police haven’t caught Pépé yet, whereupon Slimane and the rest of the force explain that things aren’t the same here as they are in Europe-you could use that for scenes of culture clash, or the officer gradually learning to work with these new ways. Similarly, the almost friendship between Slimane and Pépé really could go somewhere, especially since Slimane almost feels like a proto-Columbo, a man who plays at being lazy but who is really waiting for just the right moment to strike. All of this, plus some interesting supporting characters in Pépé’s gang and a great tension filled scene revolving around a failed attempt to lure Pépé out of the Casbah, has the potential to be a movie I would have loved. Instead, almost all of these elements are squandered.
By the midway point of the movie, it’s clear that the thing the story really wants to focus on is the love triangle between Pépé, Gaby, and Inès. While there are still some decent moments that come from that, focusing on a romance when you have all these other ideas you could work with feels cliché, especially since that wasn’t what it initially looked like the movie was going to be about. Furthermore, the movie gets more and more melodramatic as we near the end, culminating in an ending that feels exactly like the sort of thing you’d expect from a stereotypical old European movie. The whole thing ends up feeling like the worst sort of combination of a melodrama and an art film, and left me very disappointed. I will acknowledge that Gabin gives a good performance, but I think both he and Pépé as a character deserved a better movie to work with.
If you’re looking for a good crime story or are under the impression this is one of those movies you need to see if you’re serious about film, I don’t think this is worth seeking out. On the other hand, if you’re looking for ideas for stories, I’d give this one a look. I’m pretty sure you could get three or four different movies out of the material tossed away here. Perhaps this is one of those rare cases where a remake might be in order…
CAT ALERT: Cats get two separate appearances in this movie, though neither of them are overly exciting. The first is during a montage to show the cramped, squalid nature of the Casbah, where we see a cat running away with something in its mouth. A while later, when Pépé is hanging out with Inès, we see a cat sitting by her side. We never see it again, but I’m always glad to see cats deployed to add some color. As long as it doesn’t end badly for them, of course.