Rififi

Organized around a painstakingly plotted, brilliantly executed heist, Rififi inspired innumerable crime films and even a few actual crimes. Out of prison and out of cash, Tony Le Stéphanois (Jean Servais) joins an international band of burglars to organize, rehearse, and implement an ingenious plan to rob the safe of a Parisian jewelry store. The film documents their work in detail, culminating in an enthralling break-in sequence that plays out in near silence, with only chisels, drills, and scraping metal for a soundtrack. The suspense is exhilarating, but with an undertow of brutality, and the plot veers toward tragedy as the thieves’ professionalism is undone by their desires and personal ties. Blacklisted American director Jules Dassin (who also plays Cesar the safecracker, under the pseudonym Perlo Vita) won the Best Director prize at Cannes for this work that François Truffaut called “the best film noir I’ve ever seen.”