Watching this film, I repeatedly failed to shake off the "who cares?" feeling. "Le tueur" miserably fails to deliver. It is not entirely unwatchable, but this is mainly due to the presence of highly-acclaimed legends such as Gabin and Blier, who wasted their talents here majorly. The story is flimsy: dangerous criminal breaks out deviously, hides from the police with the help of old mates hoping for an escape abroad (with a girl he picked up on the way) – he keeps one step ahead of the cops all the time, partly due to his ruthlessness, until the police begin to attempt using equally cunning methods. The ending is predictably abrupt, yet lacks the ingenious elegance one is hoping for. This movie has no redeeming features such as artistic photography (though I did like the geographical locations) or striking mood-enhancing music. The characters all remain very flat. We don't take to the killer (for the obvious fact he is a ruthless killer), not even when he unconvincingly starts developing warm feelings for Gerda (Uschi Glas). Strangely enough, he is not even a convincing psycho, looking much too nice to be one. All we are left with are the apparent differences between Le Guen (Gabin) and Tellier (Blier) and the way the police are plodding to get results. And even all that is not too impressive.
