There is a major French gangster film on television this week, which has given rise to a memorable falling out between two of our biggest stars.
Fancy a movie night at home this week? You can watch a classic of French cinema on TV, featuring two essential stars of the French seventh art: Alain Delon and Jean-Paul Belmondo. And while the two actors have long been friends, this Franco-Italian feature film has also crystallized tensions between the actors, to the point of going as far as a trial…
When Borsalino was released in 1970, Belmondo and Delon were already at the height of their careers: the former had distinguished himself in Out of Breath, A Monkey in Winter, The Man from Rio Or Pierrot le fouthe second had charmed the public in Full Sun, The Leopard, The Samurai or The swimming poolThe idea of bringing the duo together on screen is not new, since the two actors shared a brief scene in Is Paris burning?. It was also the meeting of the two actors that enabled the launch of production of Borsalinoafter both actors accepted the script.
By bringing together stars of this magnitude on screen in the role of two gangsters who try to become masters of the Marseille underworld, Borsalino is a success and has more than 4 million admissions in France. Yes, but… Behind the scenes, Delon and Belmondo fall out: in their respective contracts, it was written that their names should only appear once on the poster. However, that of Alain Delon, also a producer, is listed twice.
Belmondo, who said in his memoirs that he was “angry that he had not respected [leur] “equality pact” then decided to take his colleague to court, and won his case in 1972. Belmondo would recount in A thousand lives are better than one that it was “a minor quarrel that the media made a big deal out of. We were not angry for long and we were delighted 27 years later that Patrice Leconte reunited us” in 1 in 2 chance in 1998. When “Bebel” died on September 6, 2021, Delon said he was “broken” to Europe 1, specifying that he was losing “a friend”.
If you haven’t already, you can (re)watch Borsalino on television this week. The feature film is broadcast this Sunday, July 28. Just tune in to W9, starting at 9:10 p.m., to dive into this film by Jacques Deray with Jean-Paul Belmondo and Alain Delon, but also Michel Bouquet.