DVD: Frédéric Schoendoerffer's CRIME INSIDERS (TRUANDS)

FOR TRAILERS, SEE THE BOTTOM OF THIS ARTICLE

"Crime lord and racketeer Claude Corti (Philippe Caubere)... appl[ies] a power drill to a man's knees and a knife to his eyeballs, in addition to ramming a large metal rod up an underling's rectum.... A seemingly endless supply of nubile, compliant young women runs the gamut from pole dancers to prostitutes and from sluts to whores, with rapes and beatings so standard as to be banal. Matter-of-fact male and female full-frontal nudity is capped by a few very rough sex acts." -- Variety

StudioCanal S.A. is scheduled to release Frédéric Schoendoerffer's Crime Insiders (Truands) on DVD (PAL, region 2, no subtitles) in France on August 6th; the DVD is available for pre-order from Amazon.fr (Amazon EU SARL). Mars Distribution released the movie theatrically in France on January 17th. TF1 International S.A. is the international sales agent for it.

The screenplay for Crime Insiders was written by Schoendoerffer and Yann Brion. The movie's principal cast is as follows: Benoît Magimel, Philippe Caubère, Béatrice Dalle, Olivier Marchal, Mehdi Nebbou, Tomer Sisley, Ludovic Schoendoerffer, Anne Marivin, Alain Figlarz, Cyril Lecomte, André Peron, Ichem Saïbi, Christophe Maratier, Nicky Marbot, Olivier Barthélémy, Guillaume Hédouin, Pierre-Marc Perrussel, Stefan Godin, Ben Badra, Julien Lorcy, Bruno López, Yan Epstein, Jean-Claude Bourbault, Marie Bihemle, Clément Thomas, Ivan Fegyveres, Walter Shnorkell, Fani Kolarova, Dominique Bettenfeld, Sandrine Rigaux, Ruth Sery, Mohamed Makhtoumi, Alain Zita, Moussa Maaskri, Christian Morin, Jean-Luc Abel, Bertrand Constant, Eric Sebakhi, Igor Skreblin, Mirza Halilovic, and Marina Moncade. Oksana d'Harcourt (viewer discretion is advised) apparently is also in the movie.

Here's a synopsis for Crime Insiders from StudioCanal's primary website: "Paris, 2005, organized crime. Claude Corti, 50 years, is one of the rare men to be able of the trade. Procuring, traffic of narcotics, counterfeit bills, cars, rackets, steerings, he knows all that it occurs in his zone from influence and takes a commission on all. He hates to be forgotten, he does not hesitate to show it. No scruple, no moral, never forgiveness. He is paranoiac and violent, that enables him to survive. ¶ Franck, 30 years, is a professional killer. He is close to Corti but is due to his independence. Intelligent, effective, Claude relies on him. ¶ Hicham and Larbi, small flourishing company of the sector. Corti does not like them, he uses them. Very good professionals, organized, violent, ambitious. ¶ All goes well in the worst of the worlds, some tears and corpses from time to time, much of benefit. ¶ To the first sand grain. Corti falls on a peccadillo, spends a few months in prison. Just enough so that his business starts to be put out of order. Simple paranoia or beginning of a plot? The close relations of Corti suspect Hicham and Larbi, but Corti does not believe in it, Franck either. However..."

For more information on Crime Insiders, see ScreenAnarchy's third, second, and first articles on it.

Those who are interested in Crime Insiders may also wish to read the ScreenAnarchy articles on Alain Corneau's The Second Wind (Le deuxième souffle), Régis Wargnier's Seeds of Death (Pars vite et reviens tard), and Éric Barbier's The Snake (Le serpent).

Crime Insiders trailer #1 (French w/ English subtitles; downloadable 5.3 MB WMV file -- viewer discretion is advised)
Crime Insiders trailer #2 (French w/o subtitles; downloadable 21.5 MB WMV file -- viewer discretion is advised)
Crime Insiders official subsite

StudioCanal: Crime Insiders
TF1 International: Crime Insiders
StudioCanalDVD.com: Crime Insiders DVD
Amazon.fr: Crime Insiders DVD
GOMORRAHY.com: Crime Insiders (w/ trailers, etc.)

Variety: Crime Insiders review