The Marseille Contract
Tags: murder

Plot synopsis:
Set in the mid-1950s, the story is about the "Wormsley Common Gang", a boys' gang named after the place where they live. The protagonist Trevor, or "T.", devises a plan to destroy a beautiful two-hundred-year-old house that survived The Blitz. The gang accepts the plan by T., their new leader, and executes it when the owner of the house, Mr. Thomas (whom the gang call "Old Misery"), is away during a bank holiday weekend. Their plan is to destroy the house from inside, then tear down the remaining outer structure. Mr. Thomas returns home early, however, and the gang locks him in the outhouse. T. refuses to stop until the destruction job is complete, because even the facade is valuable and could be reused. Inside, they find a mattress filled with money—which they burn. The final destruction of the house occurs when a lorry pulls away a support pole from the side of the house. Mr. Thomas is released from the outhouse by the lorry driver to see the rubble of what once was his home. When the driver finds the situation funny Mr. Thomas is incensed, but he is still unable to stop laughing.

Review: I like this movie, a good seventies action flick.
I like the Alfa Romeo Montreal that Michael Caine's character drives, an exceedingly rare and attractive model.
I feel you need to look at "The Destructors" as a group of vignettes, individually well done.While player motivations are sometimes a bit unclear,and some subplots lead nowhere, most of the main scenes are well presented.
Younger people used to the slam bang action and quick scene cuts of newer movies may call it dull, but those who appreciate fine actors like James Mason, Anthony Quinn and Michael Caine may see this as a diamond in the rough.
Yes, Tony Quinn over-emotes on occasion (e.g., poker scene) and his affair with Rita (Alexandra Stewart) goes undeveloped, but the story line itself is well paced, interesting and suspenseful.
If you're looking for an esoteric, psychologically penetrating example of the crime drama genre, this film is probably not for you.
It is, however, a 90 minute "straight, no chaser" crime caper with the obligatory chase scenes, double-crosses, romantic entanglements, etc.
Is it Caine and Mason at their best?
No, but they don't need to be to fulfill their contribution, individually and collectively, to the flow of the story line.
Also, the not-so-well known French actors (to American audiences) cast in the film were up to the task at hand.In conclusion, great camera shots of Paris, southern France and Marseille.
In no small manner, they augmented the film's overall thrust and added an extra dimension of cinematic flavor..
As a fan of Micheal Caine and of action thrillers from the seventies I was looking forward to watching this film.
I'd listened to the wickedly funky soundtrack by Roy "Get Carter" Budd, and spent a while tracking down a copy of the film on VHS.Firstly i'll deal with the good points.
Marseille is a good location to film a thriller, think of French Connection 2 for example, and it is well used.
Caine looks very seventies cool.Now for the not so good points.
Budds soundtrack although is efficient, it is too efficient for my liking, i'd like to hear more of it in the film.
There are a couple more chase scenes thrown in for good measure, but they are boring.
The acting is very very average, as is the film.In my opinion I think that the director should have made a decision to go with either A) A gritty, hard hitting thriller.
This film has both qualities at certain points within the movie, but it doesn't have the mix right.
This is a shame because it could have been much better, perhaps a bigger budget was needed, who knows.So to sum up, if Michael Caine in various seventies fashions such as roll neck sweaters, giant aviator sunglasses, a smoking jacket with cravat and the odd kipper tie floats your boat, this is the move for you!.
Decent European thriller with plenty of action , big name cast and fine secondary players.
April in Paris is a time for lovers , but for a ruthless drug baron called Jacques Brizard (James Mason) is the smuggling season and for the destructors it's the killing time .
When a US intelligence agent , Steve Ventura (Anthony Quinn) , is unable to bring a heinous kingpin to justice , he resorts to hiring and is put in contact with a likable contract killer , John Deray (Michael Caine) , who results to be a former friend .
These Three Great Protagonists Anthony Quinn , Michael Caine , James Mason Live the Sweet Life But They Play a Game of Sudden Death.Nice Paris-located crime drama with intrigue , suspense , thrills , car pursuits , twists and turns .
The picture succeeds because of the thriller , tension , as well as an intelligent written script written by Judd Bernard delving into a twisted intrigue dealing how to chase an extreme villain .
It packs an exceptionally fine camera work , attractive sequences and car crashes on the metropolitan streets , in Paris and Marseille .
This thrilling picture mingles action-packed , drama , exciting pursuits , suspense , cross and double-crosses as well as spectacular sequences though won't mean much on little screen TV .
Pulse-quickening thriller movie but plenty of clichés and lots of violence , shootouts and killings .
Anthony Quinn is top-notch as US drug agent to stop a nasty kingpin , being helped by a hired killer who turns out to be an old friend .
An animated Michael Caine stands out as the sympathetic assassin .
And James Mason is perfect , as usual , as a drug lord who belongs to aristocracy of underworld .
Colorful cinematography by Douglas Slocombe , shot on location in Gare d'Orsay, Grotte, Parc des Buttes-Chaumont , Paris , Cannes, Alpes-Maritimes, and Marseille, Bouches-du-Rhône, France .
This film also released as "The Destructors" was professionally directed by Robert Parrish , though it has some flaws and gaps .
Robert was an Academy Award-winning film editor who also realized and acted in movies .
As an editor he won an Academy Award for Body and soul (1947), the 1947 Robert Rossen film that starred John Garfield as a money-grubbing, two-timing boxer on the make.
Parrish also worked on All the King's Men (1949), an account of the rise and fall of a Louisiana politician that won the Academy Award for Best Picture.
Parrish then moved on to direct films during the 1950s and 1960s .
Among his best received works was the brooding western ¨Saddle the Wind¨ (1958) , a Noir film titled ¨Cry danger¨, a Sci-Fi picture titled ¨Journey to the far side of the sun¨, the wartime movie ¨Purple plain¨ that resulted to be one of the best films and other strange Western called ¨A town called Bastard¨ .
And of course , this his final film , the exciting thriller titled ¨The Marseille Contract¨ ..
I'll start by saying this is not a good film.
The cinematography makes poor use of the south of France location.
James Mason makes no attempt to be play a French gangster and reverts to his usual film persona - he doesn't even bother with an accent.
Antony Quinn is great though, particularly with the material he has to work with.
Overall it seems a waste of the talent in this film and the stunning locations.
Bog-standard 1970's thriller that is dull despite the cast.
Police officer Steve Ventura has tried and failed to catch Jacques Brizard  a respectable businessman who deals drugs.
In his frustration he hires a hitman to kill Brizard  the hitman turning out to be old friend John Deray.
As Deray starts to get close to Brizard, Ventura strengthens his case.I watched this back to back with another Michael Caine movie  Without a Clue.
In that his presence lifted an average film into something better.however here he can't manage it.
The action and the characters could also be in any other of hundreds of cheap thrillers.
There are few scenes that make the film interesting  Deray showing how ruthless he is on top of a building site is one of the highlights, the car chase/romance is also interesting as it was copied (but extended) for Mission: Impossible 2.Caine appears to be in a different movie from Quinn  he's happy go lucky, enjoying romantic dinners etc while Quinn is gritting it out on the streets with informers etc.
It creates a split feel to the movie  but it's better when the two come together.
Neither are good enough to make the film better than average  nor is James `The Voice' Mason, who looks like he's asleep for most of it.Overall, there are plenty of good 1970's thrillers out there that contain these actors separately (Quinn in Across 110th Street for one)  here the three can't manage to lift this out of being average and a bit dull..
Disappointing thriller despite the triple "A" cast..
The plot sounds intriguing and we know Caine can play a hit man, but he lacks any of the bite we saw as Harry Palmer.
It was his mega busy period, and this was appears to have been just another gig.James Mason is underused, having little to do,and Anthony Quinn, despite sharing several scenes with Caine, appears to be in a different film.
He looks ill at ease throughout, and a nonsensical plot twist undermines his honest cop routine.Considering the salary bill for just these three the studio could surely have hired a director who could breath some sort of life into the limp script, hang on, why was it green lighted with that script at all?
Fine cast, nice settings, but lousy plot (and sound editing).
My main reason for tracking this poorly rated 70s flick was Roy Budd's score.
Unfortunately there is almost nothing from his beautiful work in the final soundtrack, so don't lose time with this very bad movie, get Budd's score instead!
Or if you're looking for a better euro gritty 70s crime movie starring Michael Caine and making good use of a Budd score, try The Black Windmill.Mostly The Marseille Contract suffers from a story that succeeds in being both pedestrian and erratic.
Michael Caine is barely guest-starring, getting his buoyant gig while Anthony Quinn's main/gloomy story is suddenly demoted to the background.
James Mason simply says his uninteresting lines as requested, and the girls are great.Too bad Roy Budd didn't get to unleash his talent for excellent movies.
For me Get Carter is just OK-cool thanks to Budd + Caine, but they are both underused in The Marseille Contract.François de Roubaix also wrote magnificent scores for lame movies but you can watch them just to enjoy the music in context; and often his scores inflated movies above their mediocre boilerplate qualities.
And he also scored fine movies, even during the seventies..
All I knew was the cast of The Destructors before I started watching it.
How could a film starring Michael Caine, Anthony Quinn, and James Mason be bad?
It's an extremely entertaining movie with three powerhouse actors making the most of their roles.The start of the film shows Anthony Quinn and his lover Alexandra Stewart getting dressed after a liaison.
It's a perfect warning for the audience because nothing's as it seems throughout the film.
Tony's fed up and decides to take matters into his own hands by hiring a hit-man.Even more than I love the performances of the three leads—which are very good—I love Judd Bernard's screenplay.
He introduces each character with a uniquely interesting scene that helps the audience gain an accurate picture.
There are so many scenes I'd love to describe in hopes of getting you hooked on the premise, from the meaningful, tension-filled scenes between Tony and Alexandra to the introduction of Tony to Michael Caine—it's natural yet nerve-wracking.
Both Tony and Michael are particularly yummy in this film, if you happen to think either of them is handsome like I do.
James Mason has a few miles on him, but he's classy and almost regal-looking, and his sensitive expressions outweigh any bad behavior he might be getting into.
If you like any of the three actors, European-styled films, thrillers with bad boys, or want to see the famous ten-minute car chase seduction that so many films have subsequently copied, rent The Destructors for a very fun weekend movie night..
good actors.
a film who, far to be great, reminds the rules of genre in correct manner.
a sketch itself, at the first sigh, it is seductive for the tension and for the memories with many other films about same theme, for the sensitivities illustration of period, for the dust and landscapes and the tricks and the presence of actors.
a film for remember the flavor of an old cinema more than entertainment.
and delight for the fans of Anthonz Quinn, James Mason or Michael Caine..
Good Actors, Weak Script.
The actors (mainly Quinn) give the impression that a classic, perfect movie is going on.
Unfortunately after a few scenes the script shows its weakness.
But the dialogues reveal soon a number of commonplaces and the director seems not to be really convinced about the movie.
A very good performance by Anthony Quinn, while Michael Caine plays below its average..
Sort like "The French Connection" but nothing short of eye-candies.
The yellow Porsche was still a race car, but I prefer more that car Michael Caine drove.
Now in 2018, Anthony Quinn, James Mason and most of the supporting bad guys and good guys were all dead for a long time, Caine is now an very old guy too.
But look at Caine in the 70's, what a handsome dude!
Yes, I do know Marseille was the major drug export city at that time, but how come the role Mason played, a pure English breed, would have been the powerful drug lord in France?
Why Quinn hired the hitman then had the second thought and wanted to cancel the contract?
The audience gets beautiful Parisian scenery and a ton of action.
Another element that they get are pieces of recent hits jumbled together in a film that can be entertaining, but lacks in structure that makes memorable cinema.As head of an American agency involved in investigating drug trafficking, Anthony Quinn must find a hit man to knock off powerful drug cartel leader James Mason, and ironically he hires old pal Michael Caine who utilizes his wiles with women to break into Mason's circle.
The scene is almost erotic, and just one sequence where this feels like a cartoon.Finding out that Caine is wanted allegedly in Paris for murder and bank robbery, Mason has him do an impromptu hit that is beyond comical.
The way this is filmed you half expect them to remove the corpse yo leave the man shaped hole in the ground exposed.
By this point the film just falters in its obvious attempt to emulate "The French Connection" where it fails miserably.I was more interested in the scenery than the plot, although these are three of my favorite actors.
Still, the opportunity to see real streets of Paris and the parks and rivers surrounding the Eifel Tower and the train system (where Quinn jumps off and fools several of Mason's men) is fascinating.
There are certainly memorable single sequences than the ones I mention, including one with Quinn being chased by Mason's men through the underground after they abduct him that concludes with them in a lavish but abandoned train station.
Even at only 90 minutes, however, I was hoping for more than just moments, particularly a story with structure, character and real motivations, not just the thought design that "If it's written down on paper, then people will believe it.".
Dull, exceedingly unoriginal Euro-thriller..
Anthony Quinn and Michael Caine had previously worked together on the critically panned The Magus, but undeterred they reunite in this typical '70s Euro-thriller.
If rumours are to be believed, Caine accepted the role of assassin John Deray in this movie without reading a single word of the script.
Alas, The Marseille Contract is a disappointing and exceedingly familiar thriller, utterly reminiscent of a hundred other movies made around that time.
Those who have not seen many movies of this ilk might enjoy it more than others, but for the connoisseur of the '60s/'70s continental thriller there is absolutely nothing fresh about this one.American intelligence agent Steve Ventura (Anthony Quinn) is out to nail a seemingly respectable French citizen named Jacques Brizard (James Mason).
In reality Brizard is a major drug lord who uses his privileged reputation to evade the suspicion of the French police.
Unable to get close to his quarry, Ventura decides to take the unorthodox method of hiring a contract killer to erase Brizard.
The assassin who comes forth to carry out the job, much to Ventura's surprise, is John Deray (Michael Caine).
Deray sets about completing his contract, but various twists and double-crosses await along the way.When a star trio of Caine, Quinn and Mason can't save a film, you know it must be a pretty hopeless case.
Judd Bernard's clichéd script simply regurgitates characters and situations from other movies in the genre  it's basically like rolling Caravan To Vaccares, The Mackintosh Man, The French Connection II, The Mechanic and Cold Sweat into one.
If you've seen any of those films, you've more-or-less seen this one.
Director Robert Parrish goes through the motions in by-the-numbers fashion, tossing in competent car chases, cold-blooded killings and attractive locations without ever creating any real interest in the story.
Roy Budd contributes a cool score (very much of its era) and ace director-of-photography Douglas Slocombe captures the appealing locations very nicely.
But these are just minor compensations in a film of mind-numbing unoriginality.
If you are on some sort of personal quest to watch every Michael Caine film, or every Anthony Quinn film, or even every James Mason film ever made, then you may have a reason to seek out this title.
But everyone else will find it is not a film that offers its audience any particular pleasure or reward..
Bland thriller with a high dead body count.
A bland film starring Anthony Quinn as a US narc in Paris trying unsuccessfully to take down ruthless drug lord James Mason.
He brings in hit-man Michael Caine to do the job.
Although there's plenty of action, the movie is really too drab to be recommended.
Director Robert Parrish tries every camera angle imaginable in an effort to breathe life into this hokum.
Quinn dominates the first half of the film with a very forceful performance as the world weary government man and Caine takes over for the second half.
Clearly it's a tip of the hat to THE FRENCH CONNECTION's dapper drug pusher Fernando Rey. The oddball supporting cast includes Alexandra Stewart, Maurice Ronet and, in a cameo, former JFK crony Pierre Salinger (as Quinn's crusty superior).