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Les Voleurs
Thieves movie storyline. In the middle of the night, someone brings Ivan’s body home to his wife and his sad-faced, jug-eared son. Through flashbacks, the film discloses the relationships among Ivan and his brother Alex, a cop with a cleanliness fetish; siblings Juliette and Jimmy, Ivan’s partners in a seedy nightclub; the love triangle of Alex, Juliette, and Marie, a professor of philosophy; and of Alex and his nephew, Ivan’s dour, stoic son. Ivan’s death changes every relationship. Images of paragliders, sun bathers, and opera suggest an expansive, colorful world outside the constricted lives of these characters.
Thieves (French: Les Voleurs) is a 1996 French drama film directed by André Téchiné, starring Daniel Auteuil, Catherine Deneuve and Laurence Côte. The plot follows a cynical police officer, who comes from a family of thieves, and a lonely philosophy professor, both romantically involved with a self-destructive petty criminal. With a puzzling structure, the story is told through a series of flashbacks presented from four different perspectives.
Justin, a ten-year-old boy living in a small town in the Rhône-Alpes region, is awaken in the middle of the night. His mother, Mireille is crying and his widower grandfather, Victor, tells the boy that his father, Ivan, is dead. The next day, Alex, Justin’s uncle and Ivan’s younger brother, arrives for the funeral accompanied by a young woman, Juliette. Justin notice the tension between the adults. He takes his father’s gun and hides it. The story flashes backward and forward to explain what led up to Ivan’s death.
Alex, who has rebelled against his family by becoming a cop, works in the deprived La Duchere district of Lyon. He begins with his encounter, a year before Ivan’s death, when he first meets Juliette, who is brought to his office when she was arrested for shoplifting. He lets her off. He sees her again one day when he visits the sleazy nightclub run by his older brother, Ivan. Ivan is a crime boss and runs a popular club with a drag revue, funding his business through a stolen-auto ring headed up by Jimmy, who is Juliette’s brother.
The encounter between the siblings on opposite sides of the law is tense, they barely get along. Ivan is happy to show Alex that he is doing much better than him on the wrong side of the law. After their second encounter Alex and Juliette start a tortured affair beginning to meet regularly for sex. He is not in love with her, and their relationship is complicated by the young woman’s emotional and sexual involvement with Marie, a professor of philosophy. Alex spies on Marie. Ivan hears about Juliette’s relationship with Alex and threatens her. Ivan and his gang, including Juliette, plan the theft of cars in a railway deposit.
The heist at the railway marshaling yard goes disastrously wrong when Ivan is shot dead. Juliette, who had been coerced into participating, against Jimmy’s wishes, is distraught by Ivan’s death. Emotional imbalance and self-destructive, Juliette tries to commit suicide twice, first while staying with her brother and later while visiting Marie, after Ivan’s death. Marie has her interned in a psychiatric hospital to recuperate.
Thieves (French: Les Voleurs) is a 1996 French drama film directed by André Téchiné, starring Daniel Auteuil, Catherine Deneuve and Laurence Côte. The plot follows a cynical police officer, who comes from a family of thieves, and a lonely philosophy professor, both romantically involved with a self-destructive petty criminal. With a puzzling structure, the story is told through a series of flashbacks presented from four different perspectives.
Thieves – Les Voleurs (1996)
Directed by: André Téchiné
Starring: Catherine Deneuve, Daniel Auteuil, Laurence Côte, Benoît Magimel, Fabienne Babe, Didier Bezace, Julien Rivière, Ivan Desny, Naguime Bendidi, Eric Kreikenmayer
Screenplay by: André Téchiné, Gilles Taurand, Michel Alexandre
Cinematography by: Jeanne Lapoirie
Film Editing by: Martine Giordano
Costume Design by: Elisabeth Tavernier
Set Decoration by: Zé Branco
Music by: Philippe Sarde
MPAA Rating: R for strong sexuality, some violent moments and language.
Distributed by: Sony Pictures Classics
Release Date: August 21, 1996
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