Le Samouraï

In his career-defining performance, Alain Delon (The Leopard) plays Jef Costello, a contract killer with samurai instincts. After carrying out a flawlessly planned hit, Jef finds himself caught between a persistent police investigator and a ruthless employer, and his armor of fedora and trench coat cannot protect him. An elegantly stylized high-water mark for Melville, Le Samouraï is a razor-sharp cocktail of 1940s American gangster cinema and 1960s French pop culture—with a liberal dose of Japanese lone-warrior mythology thrown in for good measure.

Presented on 35mm courtesy of Institut Français.