Summary
1893. A sergent in the French army, Joseph Bouvier, shoots his girlfriend when she
rejects him and then shoots himself in the head. Both miraculously survive, and
Bouvier ends up in a filthy asylum. When Bouvier is finally released from the hospital,
he wanders the country roads of France and over the course of the next five years he rapes
and murders two dozen teenage farm workers. He is ultimately captured and proclaims
himself as God’s anarchist. The ambitious judge Rousseau has taken on the case and
is determined to use it to advance his standing and career. However, he runs the
risk of a humiliating setback if Bouvier is declared insane…
Review
Arguably Bertrand Tavernier’s most compelling film, Le Juge et l’assassin won no
less than four Césars in 1977 (including best film and best actor for Michel Galabru).
Although it is distinguished by some hauntingly beautiful photography and sublime acting
performances (notably from Philippe Noiret and Galabru), the film also offers a provocative
insight into the politics of late 19th Century France.
The crimes of Bouvier, whilst patently grotesque and unpardonable, appear less shocking
when set aside the hypocrisies and double standards of an opportunist right-wing social
elite. At one point, the Judge (played superbly by Noiret, a master when it comes
to playing ambiguous characters) surpasses the Assassin in his ruthlessness and reveals
an obscene animalistic lust for his own personal goals.
The film ends with a salutary reminder that the world represented by Judge Rousseau was
as sick as Bouvier’s and that the death of Bouvier would be overshadowed by a major social
upheaval in France at the start of the Twentieth Century.
© James Travers 2006
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