Three men to kill is only an Alain Delon vehicule. It is all about showcasing the free spirited handsome guy not caring about much, even when thrown in the middle of a deadly plot. The Delon brand was strong and even a poorly crafted movie like this was sold easily in many countries. (Side note: tellingly, central to JP Manchette's book was the powerful subtext of a bored average husband/father/executive who is only too happy to swap his boring life for deadly action; Delon was too full of himself to even consider the challenge of impersonating a dull middlebrow executive)
During the 70s there had been a couple of very good conspiracy movies. Here it is not even an ambition since the backstory is pompously explained directly in a pedestrian prologue, and then again in a wordy conclusion.
As a thriller it is pretty tame, the pace is erratic. Granted this is in line with the hero's behaviour who is strong, clever... yet really stubborn (you know, he is a free man so he just wants the bad guys to stop tracking him down ) hence plain dumb.
It seems I had actually already seen it long ago and could only remember the last scene, something totally predictable yet uncalled for: a perfect summary for such a stretch of approximative movie-making.
At some point in the movie, failing again to have Delon's character killed, the villain says "now this can't be a run of bad luck, it must be incompetence". Dumb line from this supposed mastermind: bad luck and incompetence are always one and the same. The alternative to incompetence is mischievous dishonesty. Incompetent film-maker or dishonest producers? Anyway the result is the same.
During the 70s there had been a couple of very good conspiracy movies. Here it is not even an ambition since the backstory is pompously explained directly in a pedestrian prologue, and then again in a wordy conclusion.
As a thriller it is pretty tame, the pace is erratic. Granted this is in line with the hero's behaviour who is strong, clever... yet really stubborn (you know, he is a free man so he just wants the bad guys to stop tracking him down ) hence plain dumb.
It seems I had actually already seen it long ago and could only remember the last scene, something totally predictable yet uncalled for: a perfect summary for such a stretch of approximative movie-making.
At some point in the movie, failing again to have Delon's character killed, the villain says "now this can't be a run of bad luck, it must be incompetence". Dumb line from this supposed mastermind: bad luck and incompetence are always one and the same. The alternative to incompetence is mischievous dishonesty. Incompetent film-maker or dishonest producers? Anyway the result is the same.