Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
Roman Polanski | ... | Trelkovsky | |
Isabelle Adjani | ... | Stella | |
Melvyn Douglas | ... | Monsieur Zy | |
Jo Van Fleet | ... | Madame Dioz | |
Bernard Fresson | ... | Scope | |
Lila Kedrova | ... | Madame Gaderian | |
Claude Dauphin | ... | Husband at the accident | |
Claude Piéplu | ... | Neighbor (as Claude Pieplu) | |
Rufus | ... | Georges Badar | |
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Romain Bouteille | ... | Simon |
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Jacques Monod | ... | Cafe Owner |
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Patrice Alexsandre | ... | Robert |
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Jean-Pierre Bagot | ... | Policeman |
Josiane Balasko | ... | Viviane - Office Worker | |
Michel Blanc | ... | Scope's Neighbor |
In Paris, the shy bureaucrat Trelkovsky rents an old apartment without bathroom where the previous tenant, the Egyptologist Simone Choule, committed suicide. The unfriendly concierge (Shelley Winters) and the tough landlord Mr. Zy establish stringent rules of behavior and Trelkovsky feels ridden by his neighbors. Meanwhile he visits Simone in the hospital and befriends her girlfriend Stella. After the death of Simone, Trelkovsky feels obsessed for her and believes his landlord and neighbors are plotting a scheme to force him to also commit suicide. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
A Kafkaesque thriller of alienation and paranoia. Extremely well done and Polanski performs well as the diffident introvert trying hard to adapt to his dingy Paris lodgings and his fellow lodgers. Horrifying early on because of the seeming mean and self obsessed fellow tenants and horrifying later on as he develops his defences which will ultimately be his undoing. Personally I could have done without the cross dressing element but I accept the nod to Psycho and the fact that it had some logic, bearing in mind the storyline. Nevertheless it could have worked without and would have removed the slightly theatrical element, but then maybe that was intended because the courtyard certainly seems to take on the look of a theatre at the end. I can't help feel that there are more than a few of the director's own feelings of not being a 'real' Frenchman and Jewish to boot. Still, there is plenty to enjoy here including a fine performance from a gorgeous looking Isabelle Adjani and good old Shelly Winters is as reliable as ever.