LE DOSSIER 51
France, 1978, 108 minutes, Colour.
Francoise Beliard, Patrick Chesnais.
Directed by Michel Deville.
A French thriller in the spirit of the seventies, especially in the move towards uncovering cover-ups. It is a thriller about surveillance and could be compared with Francis Ford Coppola's 74 thriller, The Conversation. The spies of the foreign power are trying to compile a dossier on a French diplomat whom they wish to have a hold on to sabotage economic negotiations. The film traces in great detail the means used for surveillance, the co-ordinating of the material obtained, the styles of questioning and discovering material about the person under surveillance. At times this is so contrived that it is frighteningly ludicrous. However, it is a grim reality and eventually they do discover the hero's secret and then proceed to gain power over him. The film has a documentary look but has the persuasion of a thriller.
1. An interesting and entertaining thriller? Style, content? Its corresponding to realities of international espionage of the seventies?
2. A French production? French atmosphere, style? For a French audience, international audience? The spy thriller, surveillance?
3. The colour photography, the locations, the special effects used for surveillance and showing the surveillance at work? Musical score? The importance of the editing?
4. How realistic was the plot? The reality of espionage at any time, the sophistication of technology for surveillance? The groups employed in such espionage, their stands, their intelligence, devices? Means and manoeuvres? The inevitability of their succeeding? The contrivance of the screen play with its facts and figures and dates? The screenplay showing what a dossier of surveillance is like? The ultimate impact of the audience sharing in this espionage work?
5. The hero as victim? His being presented in his ordinary situation, his wife, mother, relationships? His skill at his work? Colleagues? The audience and their expectations of his flaw being discovered? The details of seeing him at work, his responsibility, his rising in his career? The ultimate discovery? The screenplay's contriving to have homosexual relationships as his flaw? The power of the group to have a hold over him through this means? The ugliness of the ending and its tragedy?
6. How well did the film detail the characters in Dominique's life? The women, their being interrogated and the devices used for this? His friendships? The homosexual liaisons?
7. The presentation of those involved in surveillance, their speeches, their anonymity9 The people used as agents? Techniques? The submerging of personality and values to their work? Lack of scruple?
8. How interesting were the episodes in the dossier, from a psychological point of view, thriller point of view, the building up of the dossier?
9. Audience response to the final closing in of those surveying? The finishing of the dossier?
10. The sabotage of the dossier and the irony of the group having to begin again? the tragedy of having destroyed a life?
11. The political implications of the film - nations and multinational powers involved in such control? The invasion of privacy and individual rights to privacy? The decision to have a hold on a person, destroy his life? The means and the end? the end supposedly justifying all means?
