Classe Tous Risques (1960) [The Big Risk] BFI 1080p BluRay x265 HEVC FLAC-SARTRE

After hiding out in Milan for nearly a decade, fugitive gangland chief Abel Davos (Lino Ventura) sneaks back to Paris with his children despite a death sentence hanging over his head. Accompanied by appointed guardian Eric Stark (Jean-Paul Belmondo, fresh off his star turn in Breathless) and beset by backstabbing former friends, Abel begins a journey through the postwar Parisian underworld that's both throat grabbing and soul searching. A character study of a career criminal at the end of his rope, this rugged noir from Claude Sautet (Un coeur en hiver) is a thrilling highlight of sixties French cinema.

Extras

• Lino Ventura on Classe Tous Risques and his Career - Italian born Lino Ventura was one of French cinema's most iconic actors, often playing the role of a hard-boiled gangster alongside Jean Gabin. In the first piece presented here, which originally aired on March 22, 1960 on Le Journal Televise, he speaks to journalist Mario Beunat about working on Classe tous risques. In the second piece, made up of excerpts from archival interviews with Ventura, he reflects candidly on his career.

• Claude Sautet ou la magie invisible - In 2000 film critics N.T. Binh and Dominique Rabourdin conducted seventeen hours of audio interviews with Claude Sautet. Their resulting documentary is excerpted here in a segment that includes Sautet, writer Jose Giovanni, and filmmaker Bertrand Tavernier talking about Classe tous risques.

• Interview with novelist and screenwriter Jose Giovanni - Jose Giovanni was a former death-row inmate who became a well-known dialogist and screenwriter adapting many of his own novels to the screen, including Classe tous Risques. Film critic N.T. Binh interviewed Giovanni for his documentary Claude Sautet ou la magie invisible. Binh returned to the raw footage of that interview and edited a new piece exclusively for this release.

• Monsieur Ventura - An in-depth look at the life and legacy of the great Italian actor. The documentary contains clips from archival interviews with Lino Ventura, actor/singer Charles Aznavour, writer/director/actor Jose Giovanni, assistant director Claude Pinoteau, and actor Henri Cogan, amongst others.

• French Trailer

• US Trailers