Inspector Bellamy

Depardieu's deteriorated condition and excessive weight were a huge viewer distraction as he rolled thru romantic scenes and labored on stairs. You began to wonder if he would be the real victim of the movie. It was about the only element adding to the tension in an otherwise silly looking movie.

Run-of-the-mill French talkie which is marred by a couple of poor casting decisions (not Depardieu or Bunel, who are both good). Works better as a character study than a detective story; either way, a fairly forgettable film.

A cops-and-robbers story that possesses a number of peculiarly French virtues: the good guys aren't necessarily so good, the bad guys not necessarily so bad, nobody finds much time for gunfights or machismo, and in general this movie is every bit about how much the cop loves his wife and hates his ne'er-do-well brother as it is about the crime and its investigation. This American finds this approach refreshing. It's also nice to see Depardieu still such a commanding presence at 60

"The death of Claude Chabrol inevitably saddles Inspector Bellamy, the prolific French New Waver's final feature, with a coda-status heft that the wispy opus cannot possibly shoulder." - Fernando F. Croce

Chabrol re-imagines the detective genre in the course of practicing it.