Line #31 Film/LeSamourai


1	[[quoteright:227:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Le_Samourai2_8938.jpg]]
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3	->''"There is no greater solitude than that of the samurai, unless it is that of the tiger in the jungle... Perhaps..."''
4	-->--''[[BlatantLies The Book of Bushido]]''
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6	''Le Samouraï'', known in the US as ''The Godson'' or ''Cop Out'' (no, not ''that'' ''Film/CopOut''), is a 1967 French crime thriller directed by Creator/JeanPierreMelville and starring Creator/AlainDelon. It follows a perfectionist hitman named Jef Costello as he sets up an alibi, performs a hit, and then tries to get away with it, all while staying true to his Bushido-like {{code of honor}}. He eventually finds himself on the run from both the police and [[ContractOnTheHitman his former employers]].
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8	''Le Samourai'' is famous for being one of the first films to deal with the existential hero, and for [[{{Deconstruction}} deconstructing]] many of the tropes of the crime thriller and assassin genres.
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11	!!This film includes examples of:
12	* TheAlibi: Before performing a hit, Jef Costello sets up an alibi: he asks his mistress to pretend that he has spent the night with her. Just after the hit, he goes to his mistress's flat to bump into her boyfriend as he comes back home. Then he goes to an underground gambling parlour.
13	* AntiHero: Jef Costello is very much a [[NominalHero Type IV]]. He is a hitman who doesn't really do any heroic deeds throughout the story though he doesn't hurt any innocents and [[spoiler:does choose to protect his alibi rather than leave her to die]].
14	* BadassInANiceSuit: In a suit, tie, trenchcoat, white gloves, and perfectly positioned fedora at all times. Jef Costello cares as much about his appearance as he does about his alibi.
15	* BatmanGambit: Jef plants himself outside his girlfriend's apartment when her other lover comes home before making his hit. Later, when the lover is brought in to identify Jef, he recognizes and fingers him, thinking he's nailing him for a crime, when in reality he's offering him an airtight alibi for the murder.
16	* BlatantLies: The opening quote is ostensibly from "the book of Bushido". In reality, it came from director Jean-Pierre Melville's imagination.
17	* CagedBirdMetaphor: Brought up with Jef's caged bullfinch.
18	* TheChanteuse: In this case, a nightclub pianist. She sees Jef leaving the scene of a kill.
19	* ConspicuousTrenchcoat: Jef's choice of unsuspicious-looking clothes is a trenchcoat and fedora. It makes sense in the setting, but even if it didn't, RuleOfCool would turn this trope into something more like a BadassLongcoat situation. It's certainly very conspicuous, as a whole bunch of people spot him leaving the nightclub.
20	* ContractOnTheHitman: After he's briefly taken into custody by the police (despite having what appears to be an airtight alibi), Jef's employers decide they'd rather kill him than risk him implicating them.
21	* DeliberatelyMonochrome: ''Everything'' in Jef's shabby little apartment is gray--the floor, the walls, the sheets. Even the bird is gray! The opening scene looks like it's a black-and-white film, except for Jef's face providing a little SplashOfColor. The nightclub where Jef kills a guy is also monochromatic, done up in all black and silver and glass. The police department where Jef is taken for a lineup is similarly monochromatic
22	* DoomedProtagonist: Pretty much the whole idea behind the film and its take on the Crime genre.
23	* FedoraOfAsskicking: Costello's. It's also how he's identified by some of the witnesses.
24	* FilmNoir: Seen as a definitive example of neo-noir films for its style and pacing. Even though it's a crime movie, it has only ''three'' scenes involving guns.
25	* HitmanWithAHeart: Costello would rather die alone than kill [[InLoveWithTheMark the bystander who supported his alibi.]]
26	* TheHeroDies: For a given value of "hero", Jef Costello takes a bullet for the nightclub singer, one of the bystanders that witnessed his killing spree.
27	* IncestSubtext: Melville cast Nathalie Delon as Costello's first romantic interest because they looked more like siblings than lovers, and wanted that sort of awkwardness between them for the audience. It gets weird when you realize the two of them were husband and wife in real life, and [[IdenticalStranger not related at all]].
28	* IncrediblyObviousBug: Subverted. When the Paris police sneak into assassin Jef Costello's apartment to plant a listening device, the one they initially choose is a huge black box with a big antenna and a red light. The officer puts it in the hiding place, scrutinizes it briefly, and then decides to go with a smaller model.
29	* InLoveWithTheMark: Jef is implied to feel this way about the nightclub musician who supported his alibi (and she to him), but it might just be his code of honor.
30	* MarketBasedTitle / NonindicativeTitle: For its US release, ''Le Samourai'' was retitled ''The Godson'' in order to cash in on the gangster craze started by ''Film/TheGodfather''.
31	* MatchCut: From the head gangster pacing his office as he muses on the need to kill Costello to the head police detective doing the exact same thing as he muses on Costello's getaway.
32	* MeaningfulName: The main character's (not French at all) name, "Jef Costello", is a reference to both Robert Mitchum's character in the ''FilmNoir'' classic ''Out Of the Past'' and to famous American mobster Frank Costello.
33	* NervesOfSteel: Jef is calm to the point of catalepsy, hardly ever reacting, not twitching a facial muscle when he has to kill a guy, or when someone is trying to kill him, or when he's locking eyes with the pianist who can send him to jail if she identifies him. That's why it's so effective in the one scene where he is rooting through his set of keys, trying to steal a car before the police dragnet finds him again, and he is visibly nervous.
34	* TheOner: The opening shot of Jef on his couch, with a slow, jerky VertigoEffect to go with it (WordOfGod says this is to emphasize Costello's lonliness and mental instability).
35	* PoliceAreUseless: The police go to a lot of time and effort to plant a bug in Costello's apartment. But only bother to hide it behind a curtain.
36	* ProfessionalKiller: Partially averted. Jef is extremely skilled and ''certainly'' a BadassInANiceSuit (see above), but barely speaks and lives in a crapsack two-room apartment with only a bird for company.
37	* TheQuietOne: Jef Costello barely speaks throughout the film and it takes about 10 minutes for him to utter a single line of dialogue.
38	* TheRemake: A loose remake of the 1942 American film noir ''Film/ThisGunForHire'' starring Creator/AlanLadd.
39	* RuleOfThree: A dramatic example. We see the [[CrazyPrepared massive ring of keys]] three times, twice from Costello and once from the police.
40	* SignatureStyle: Costello puts on white gloves before every kill. This is a trademark of Jean-Pierre Melville.
41	* SilenceIsGolden:
42	** The movie goes ten minutes before the first word of dialogue. The first three scenes--Jef leaves his apartment, Jef steals a car, Jef meets a fellow hoodlum who changes the plates and gives him a gun--take place in silence, and not a word is spoken until he meets Jane to arrange an alibi.
43	** The entire scene where the cops break into Jef's apartment, set up a bug, and begin recording in a hotel across the street is also presented without a word of dialogue.
44	* SkeletonKey: Costello carries a huge ring of keys that enables him to steal any Citroën DS. Tension is created in one scene as he tests one key after another in an ignition as two patrolling police officers walk down the sidewalk towards him; the car starts before they get close enough to realise he's stealing it.
45	* SuicideByCop: Seemingly Jef's plan in the end, as he goes back to the nightclub, goes right up to the piano player, points a gun at her, and is shot down by the cops--only for the detective in charge to take a look at Jef's gun and see that it isn't loaded. And we know he left it unloaded on purpose because the gun ''was'' loaded when he checked it before entering the nightclub.
46	** If all of this wasn't proof enough, Melville's intended ending for the movie was to show the already deceased Jef [[GoOutWithASmile joyfully smiling for the one and only time in this film]]. Stills of this scene can be easily found by googling.
47	* UnnaturallyBlueLighting: Used to emphasize the cold nature of the characters and to invoke the feel of FilmNoir. Director Melville said that his goal was to try to "make a black-and-white film in color".
48	* WesternSamurai: Jef Costello is a French mob hitman that follows the Bushido CodeOfHonour.
49	* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: [[spoiler:The overpass shooter who tried to kill Jef is still tied up in his apartment.]]

Context Film / LeSamourai