Customer Reviews

Coup de torchon (Widescreen)

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This review is for the Criterion Collection DVD edition of the film.

Coup de Torchon, known also as "Clean Slate" is better translated as "Wipe of the Cloth" as a cloth would clean a slate chalkboard.

This film is set in the year 1938 on the eve of World War II and is about a recist white policeman in Senegal, (then called French West Africa) who always looks the other way when a crime is committed. One day he goes berserk and starts killing people.

I found this movie to be boring but loved the scenery of the village.

The DVD has a US theatrical trailer for a special feature along with an interview with the director and an alternate ending presented by the director.

Very unusual movie. I was unprepared for such a strange story. Only after the movie was over did I glimpse Jim Thompson's name in the credits and it dawned on me so that is what I have been watching. Thompson's name is synonymous with hard-boiled noir and if you like that genre then this is for you though the setting will throw even the most ardent noir fan for a bit of a loop. Noir in Africa? Phillips Noiret plays the sherrif of a West African town in the thrall of the worst kind of colonialism. Unforunately he's not much of a law and order man. In fact he is completely ineffective at administering any kind of justice whatsoever. Blacks are brutally mistreated right in front of him and he does nothing. Hes the sherrif only in name and at home he is abused by his wife played by Stephane Audran who does not hide the fact she is sleeping with her live-in "brother". The sherriff takes all kinds of abuse til one day he reaches his breaking point. He decides he's had enough and so he begins administering his own brand of "justice". In a western movie or in a gritty American noir this kind of scenario would seem commonplace but not in the middle of sunny Africa. Noirs aren't supposed to be exposed to sunlight, are they? The novel was set in the American South but Tavernier decided he would transplant the story in African soil. Its a film that is hard to fathom. I believe it takes at least one viewing to get used to the idea of an African Noir and then another to see just what Tavernier is up to. So I would highly recommend anyone see the film twice before making up their mind about it. One thing is undoubtedly certain and that is the acting. The performances by Noiret, Audran, and Isabelle Huppert(one of her most stunning vacant faced roles) are perfect and the most fascinating aspect of the film is watchng each unwind. Even those who don't normally have a taste for noir will find this very dark comedy quite compelling. On first viewing I felt there was something missing like at least one strong black character but then I realized on second viewing that that is part of the power of this comedy. These characters are so selfish it matters very little to them where they are. And so the abscence of black characters and the abscence of any interaction between whites and blacks except on the most superficial and degrading terms underlines the utter selfishness of the whites. The blacks going about their business largely ignored by the whites offer a subtle comparison. The blacks live humane lives. The whites are only capable of committing crimes against each other. If you are part of the white community in such circumstances you become corrupt if not for what you yourself do for what you refuse to see as the underlying injustice of the circumstance you see and participate in everyday. The circumstance is a timebomb. Noiret as the sherrif is the one who goes off. He acts out against white hate and anger and bigotry only to become infected himself by those very properties. So at first I was unsure but ultimately I marveled at what Tavernier did with this noir material. He gave the material the very dimension it lacked, a social dimension. By placing this noir in a strikingly new context the typical noir theme (being the darkness of human nature) is given a more specific context and scope (the darkness of colonial mans nature). Tavernier brings new life and significance to the commonplaces of Thompsons fiction and more importantly he brings a new approach and new insight to the colonial predicament.

I am mainly disappointed with the Yank reviews - did they read Jim Thompson at all? Yeah - the PULP FICTION movie is great for them but not the real "pulp fiction". It would be a surprise if Tavernier did a "Martin Eden" or "Iron Heel" and folks would label it "pulp fiction" as well. How about "Les Miserables", huh ? A pulp fiction ? Let's go on and on...
Get fiction in the wrong hands and you have a disaster right away, say Sir Spielberg, as an example, he's the master of the "hokey", lately.
This film proves the ages old wisdom that good films are made of mediocre novels, like "The Informer", "The Shop on Main Street" etc., while the great script of classical "belles lettres" remain beyond reach of the infantile contemporaries.

Philippe Noiret's character, quintessentially French, sardonic, funny and witty is sometimes overwhelmed by the pace and setting of this film. The underlying themes and metaphors ultimately, if uneasily, resolve but the hugely funny slapstick elements superimposed on the murderous mayhem is a difficult balance.

Philippe Noiret generally did an outstanding acting job in all the films I've seen him. This one is no exception. Bertrand Tavernier is also one of my favorite directors. Novelist Jim Thompson wrote great noir dramas. Putting the three of them together was a great idea even though the whole thing was moved to Afica, which none of the three had in their background. Isabelle Huppert, an actress I don't like, is in the film also but she plays someone that is disliked and avoided by her husband (Noiret) too so she was ok here. Noiret plays policeman Lucien Cordier, who is weak and easily corruptible. He has no one's respect. Just as the viewer is about to feel some sympathy towards him, however, he becomes the ultimate bad guy, solely driven by gaining revenge against everyone in his world. The film is almost too successful in that by the end of it I have had it with Noiret's character, his world, Africa and the whole story. I think it overplayed its hand. But most of the way through it is very enjoyable viewing and it is certainly worth an evening's viewing at home.

When they are on location, film directors usually tend to forget the actors in order to become for a while only still photographers. If James Bond is in Paris, one can be sure to enjoy a free guided tour of the city including the Eiffel Tower, Les Champs-Elysées and l'Arc de Triomphe. So, when one reads that the story of french director Bertrand Tavernier's COUP DE TORCHON is happening in the French West Africa of 1938, wild images begin to fly through the movie lover's anxious mind : elephants, lions, snakes, Tarzan, glorious sunsets and other african clichés suddenly make their appearance in front of his very eyes.

But amateurs of touristic trips will be very disappointed with Tavernier's use of african landscapes. The director is even playing with us in the scene involving the french rock singer Eddy NONO Mitchell standing on his bed because something is moving under his bed. We are all waiting for a snake, a scorpion or a colourful spider to burst out while the dangerous animal is finally described as a vulgar night butterfly that the director doesn't even judge necessary to show to the audience. Bertrand Tavernier is not following the usual codes of the genre and is saying it.

In fact, Bertrand Tavernier doesn't follow any codes in COUP DE TORCHON. The main character, Philippe LUCIEN CORDIER Noiret, is presented as a weak corrupted policeman despised by the local bad boys. Once he has earned a bit of our sympathy, he turns into a machiavelic no-law madman driven by revenge. The last scene of COUP DE TORCHON deserves to stay in movie history : Philippe Noiret, by the sole power of his eyes and gestures, makes us understand that he has become completely mad.

So why Africa ? For its strange atmosphere, for its heat, for its colours. Bertrand Tavernier explains it very clearly during the interview you will find as extra-feature with this Criterion release. An alternate ending, not very convincing, is also presented as well as the american trailer of this 1981 movie which, in my opinion, is a masterpiece.

A DVD for your library.

This is the best film adaptation of Jim Thompson to date, and a marvellous film beside that fact. Tavernier knows the book throughout but doesn't bow to it; he builds his own movie out of the story filling it with character and nuance. He doesn't cop out like Peckinpah, or try to be too clever - he makes a classic film that works, not because he builds on convention, but because he makes it all his own. The actors, especially Noiret, appear to be thoroughly enjoying the filming and provide us with sly performances that don't knock you over only because they are too subtle for that. Truly a wonderful film, startling in its bursts of violence and in its understated black humor. Pay attention and the rewards will be many.

Based on Thompson's book Pop 1280 (brilliant, short, haunting, and like no other book I've ever read), I believe this to be a very failed attempt. But a worthy failure nontheless. Surely worth buying or renting to satisfy one's curiosity (I believe I had to wait over 10 years to finally see it). I think the filmmakers, if working today, would have had the guts to film the book as it was meant to be. A friend once called the story "Barney Fife meets Taxi Driver", which certainly is understandable. I would add Bester's The Stars My Destination to the list. Sound ridiclously impossible? It apparently was to the filmmakers, too. Read the book first and film it in your own mind.

This is the film version of Jim Thompson's dark comedy "Pop. 1280" transplanted from Texas to French-colonial Africa. Noiret is the secretly-smart sherriff who slowly goes insane from the brutality and backwardness of the life he is forced to endure. Huppert is dang sexy as the woman who helps triggers the violence. Brilliant film switches back and forth from dark humor to horror: it keeps you guessing and on edge. Yes, you could say it is a mix of Kafka, Beckett, and good old-fashioned American madness, with a Gallic accent. Over the years this sly but scarifying movie has become one of my favorites.

just as in Shakespeare, everybody dies, and we are very happy about it. Noiret and Eddy Mitchel are excellent, disturbing