Sightlines · how to watch
How to watch Mesrine: Killer Instinct
2008 · Jean-François Richet · Mesrine: Killer Instinct on Sightlines
5 things to watch and listen for on a first viewing, without spoilers, and 3 more once you have seen it. Each names something you can see or hear, the pattern it belongs to, and what noticing it gives you. How these keys work.
On a first viewing
Notice that the film opens by showing Mesrine's death. (structure)
Jean-François Richet begins with the 1979 police ambush and then rewinds twenty years, so you already know how the story ends before it begins.
Payoff: Knowing the outcome in advance changes what you're watching for during the rest of the film.
Notice how close and unglamorous the violence looks on screen. (camera)
Robert Gantz shoots with wide-angle lenses close to the actors, and the images stay bright and harsh rather than softened by nostalgic sepia tones.
Payoff: The rawness of the look keeps the film from sliding into heritage-movie nostalgia.
Listen for how flat and unamplified the gunshots sound. (sound)
The film reports gunfire in something close to real time, without the boosted, dramatic sound design that Hollywood action usually applies to violence.
Payoff: The plainness of the sound keeps the crime world feeling physical rather than glamorous.
Watch Cassel's posture even in scenes where Mesrine is alone. (performance)
Vincent Cassel plays Mesrine with a coiled readiness, as if performing for an audience whether or not anyone else is actually in the room.
Payoff: The performance suggests a man who is always constructing an image of himself, never settling into one fixed self. In the reading: le faussaire (the forger). The reading calls a person who keeps remaking his own identity a forger, someone who makes truth rather than simply hiding it.
Notice how differently the Algeria scenes are shot from Paris. (staging)
The opening Algerian War sequences are dirtier and more disorienting than the Parisian scenes that follow, staged to feel rougher and less controlled.
Payoff: The visual break suggests a connection between what Mesrine survived and what he later becomes.
The 3 rewatch keys open on this page when you choose "Seen it?".
Carry this in: Watch how often Mesrine seems to be performing for someone. The charm and the danger are the same act.