Bob the Gambler

Bob Montagné, a reformed bank robber, is a man of honor in the shady neighborhood of Pigalle. Despite making (or losing) money playing cards, he helps the needy, supports a dead friend’s son, maintains a dubious relationship with a young provincial woman, and is even respected by a police superintendent whose life he saved. But all this does not deter Bob from planning the ultimate heist of a highly secured casino. In Bob the Gambler, a highlight of his early career, Melville – mastermind of crime movies – employs realistic cinematic devices to create an affective drama. “The combination of poetry and toughness accumulates to a contemplative work on the essence and meaning of the entire genre” (Uri Klein, Haaretz).