Blood to the Head

François Cardinaud once worked on the docks; now he is one of the wealthiest shipowners in La Rochelle. His rise has earned him resentment along with the respect. One day his wife Marthe leaves the house without a word of explanation and goes to the man of her youth, a small-time criminal just back from Africa. The moment the town hears about it, everything Cardinaud spent years building starts to crack. Gilles Grangier directed it from a 1942 Georges Simenon novel, with dialogue by Michel Audiard. It was the third film Gabin and Grangier made together and it is characteristic of both: a man who says little and keeps his anger inside, narrow streets, the sea, and the fact that moving up a class is never entirely forgiven. What Cardinaud is really dealing with is not getting his wife back but working out who he is again.