Adieu l’ami

• (Also known as Farewell, Friend / Reissued as Honor Among Thieves)
• Directed by Jean Herman
• August 14, 1968 (France)

Two former French Foreign Legion members plan to break into the vault of a French company over Christmas break.

I have been on a bit of a Bronson kick lately. He was one of the great screen toughs yet to my disappointment what I have actually seen of him is very limited. Most of his stuff was exceedingly violent and thus totally off limits to me as a kid. Now as an independent adult (and my fiancé’s indifference depending on the situation) I can do as I please. So as long as I can find it I can watch all those Charles Bronson movies I missed.

Adieu l’ami (also known as Farewell, Friend and reissued as Honor Among Thieves) is from Charles Bronson’s European days. All the things you would expect from a Charles Bronson experience with maybe a little bit more nuanced performances are present in this movie. And here he is paired with French acting legend Alain Delon who was well on his way to his current status by this point. That says something about Bronson.

This is nominally a Christmas film in the same way that Die Hard is. While set around Christmas, the holiday itself is not important for things to unfold as they do. It’s about two opposing sides who around Christmas time are trying to break into a safe in the basement of a French company. One is trying to put something back while the other is trying to steal the money he believes is within. It’s a heist film-sort of. It is a heist film where everything goes wrong and the characters after bonding find themselves framed for a crime neither actually committed.

It doesn’t build to a big finale or a nail-biting finish. It’s a slow paced and quieter movie that relies on the characters rather than action to get you from Point A to Point B. The meat of the movie is about watching these two people who don’t necessarily get along that well form a bond and at least by the end have a level of respect for each other. They may not be friends, but they are not enemies. The mystery and general issues they must surmount are secondary.

Alain Delon is certainly the star as former Foreign Legion medic Dino Barran that is roped into helping an attractive woman named Isabelle Moreau (Olga Georges-Picot) whose lover he accidentally killed while serving in the French Foreign Legion. Dino is a disillusioned man trying to make up for a wrong though how that wrong came about either I missed or they decided it did not matter. And it would seem to be rather significant but is touched on not nearly enough especially since it justifies what he decided to get himself involved with.

I was pleasantly surprised by Bronson as Franz Propp. As a character he is not a good man but a man with a code that added complexity to Bronson’s better known tough guy persona. He even manages a level of genuine charm despite being a pimp since leaving the French Foreign Legion. I like how this movie never directly called him a ‘pimp’ but uses a scene to show you that as well as set-up his character.

The plot by the REAL villains came together a touch too easily. In my opinion things needed to be slowed down a bit then again the real story was how Propp and Barran bridged their differences. At its heart Adieu l’ami is about the characters and not the theft or double-cross or anything like that.

Adieu l’ami is a good film. Not as hyper violent or action heavy as one would expect from Charles Bronson who along with Alain Delon turns in a great performance in a more good than bad film.