Accomplished biopic that rattles through its two hours but is carried to some extent by the audaciousness of the events it documents rather than the strength of the filmmaking.

Mesrine's attempt to rival Hollywood crime movies' magnum force -- either through B-movie precision or A-movie elaborateness -- fails.

"Vincent Cassel deserves better scenery to devour." - Simon Abrams

One word - Impressive!!!! Not only has it been a while since such a great gangster film has been released, but this one is so packed with content, you'll think you've been watching it a lot longer than the actual 96 mins for the first part. This is without doubt Cassell's finest role to date and for me already being such a fan of this Actor, the performance totally blew me away. Another pleasant surprise was the role played by Depardieu, who was almost unrecognisable in his role and played it ra

Fantastic piece of French crime cinema. Vincent Cassell is immense as Jaques Mesrine. Anyone with a passing interest in Euro cinema or crime movies should give this a watch.

Well made, with a fine central performance by Cassel. There isn't much going on here apart from a fairly episodic telling of Mesrine's life, but it worth seeing.

Episodic crime tale with some gripping moments but light on substance. It can be a surprisingly fine line between presenting gangsters as heroes or anti-heroes, and I feel like this film lands on the wrong side of that line as much as it does on the right. Cassel turns in another good performance, and the supporting cast are all pretty good, too. The visual style is a bit too pointlessly flashy a lot of the time, and Richet must really love De Palma for all the split-screen shots he uses.

Another fantastic french film. They know how to make gangster movies. Great watch.

A really good amazing movie. The story and direction is amazing backed by an amazing performance by Vincent Cassel. A must watch for all crime movie.

Good Movie

78.250

Not enough surrender.

Richet banned 2 hours of pure, cold blooded violence on celluloid.He succeeds a string between arthouse- and action cinema.After disappointing Hollywood Bockbusters,L'instinct de mort is my first Crime Highlight 2009.Looking forward to part 2.

It's amazing how you start to develop sympathy for a bad guy like Mesrine within this movie. It may be due to Cassel who did a great job just like all the main actors. Richet did well too cause he led everyone through a story full of excessive brutality without losing the feeling when to stop. So, in a way this one is something like a french version of goodfellas. 15/06/09

The film jumped from event to event without fluidity. Some of the scenes were too extravagant and took away from the realism and emotions the film worked to create. Vincent Cassel, as expected, did a wonderful portrayal of Mesrine, but his performance could do only so much.

Enjoyable as all hell, and probably one of my favourite biopics. The action is tense as all hell, and I like how it manages to make a bastard like Mesrine seem sympathetic at times.

I'm ashamed to have lived in too Anglocentric an environment to have heard of Jacques Mesrine. He was an honest-to-God international outlaw who basically seemed to live out a Michael Mann film, except that he had a personality. Which is vividly brought to life (and death) in both chapters by the excellent Vincent Cassel, the perfect casting choice for the charismatic, narcissistic, near-lunatic gangster legend.

Well-shot but disappointing action film with no structure, just an endless repetitive cycle of robberies, shoot-outs, car chases, imprisonments, escapes, and changing facial hair. None of the performers, nor the director, can save it from its senseless script, which jumps randomly from one moment in Mesrine's life to the next with no continuity or meaning.

Large portions of Mesrines life are excluded from this biopic. Which leaves us with brief vignettes portraying the essence of the man. This can come across as either lazy directing or bold. The decision is up to the viewer whether this kind of stop/start, almost incidental film making sits with them. Either way these iconic scenes add up to describe an iconic man. Death or Freedom he repeats, words you could confuse with Napoleon's. Times have changed, instead his legacy is one of an outlaw.

Disappointingly formulaic, but worth watching all the same.

Well worth a watch.