Jules Dassin made an indelible mark on the film noir and gangster genres with The Naked City, Night and the City, and Rififi, one of the first big caper films. (Dassin, an American director, was driven out of Hollywood during the McCarthy era; Night and the City was made in Britain, while Rififi became one of the most famous French gangster films ever made.) Jean-Pierre Melville was originally assigned to direct Rififi, but he later reported that he was very pleased with Dassin’s final product. Steeped in the details of the sleazy Montmartre neighborhood, Rififi does for Paris what The Naked City did for New York.