''Place Vendôme'' is a 1998 French crime drama film directed by

Nicole Garcia Nicole Garcia (born 22 April 1946) is a French actress, film director and screenwriter. Her film '' Charlie Says'' was entered into the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. Her film ''Going Away'' was screened in the Special Presentation section at the 20 ...

, starring

Catherine Deneuve Catherine Fabienne Dorléac (born 22 October 1943), known professionally as Catherine Deneuve (, , ), is a French actress as well as an occasional singer, model, and producer, considered one of the greatest European actresses. She gained recogni ...

, and named after the

Place Vendôme The Place Vendôme (), earlier known as Place Louis-le-Grand, and also as Place Internationale, is a square in the 1st arrondissement of Paris, France, located to the north of the Tuileries Gardens and east of the Église de la Madeleine. It is ...

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

. Deneuve won the

Volpi Cup The Venice Film Festival or Venice International Film Festival ( it, Mostra Internazionale d'Arte Cinematografica della Biennale di Venezia, "International Exhibition of Cinematographic Art of the Venice Biennale") is an annual film festival he ...

for Best Actress at the 55th Venice International Film Festival for her role in the film.

Plot

Vincent Malivert is the head of a prestigious jewel broker's firm on the exclusive Place Vendôme. Hampered by debt and implicated in trafficking of stolen jewels, he commits suicide, leaving his wife Marianne to pick up the pieces. Marianne, who has spent the last few years in and out of a clinic recovering from alcoholism, discovers a set of perfect cut diamonds in her husband's safe. Although she knows the diamonds are probably stolen, she decides to use this opportunity to rebuild her life and sets about trying to find a buyer for the hidden jewels. Unwittingly, she is drawn to a shady dealer named Battistelli, the very man who drove her into a disastrous and loveless marriage.

Cast

as Marianne Malivert *

Jean-Pierre Bacri Jean-Pierre Bacri (24 May 1951 – 18 January 2021) was a French actor and screenwriter. He frequently worked in collaboration with Agnès Jaoui. Life and career One of Bacri's earliest film appearances was '' Subway''. He co-wrote with Jaoui ...

as Jean-Pierre *

Emmanuelle Seigner Emmanuelle Seigner (born 22 June 1966) is a French former fashion model, singer, and actress. She is known for her roles in '' The Diving Bell and the Butterfly'' (2007), ''The Ninth Gate'' (1999) and '' Frantic'' (1988). She has been nominate ...

as Nathalie *

Jacques Dutronc Jacques Dutronc (born 28 April 1943) is a French singer, songwriter, guitarist, composer, and actor. He married singer Françoise Hardy on 30 March 1981 and together they have a son (manouche jazz) guitarist Thomas Dutronc, born 1973); they sep ...

as Serge Battistelli *

Bernard Fresson Bernard Fresson (27 May 1931 – 20 October 2002) was a French actor who primarily worked in film. Born in Reims, France, to a French baker, Fresson attended the Lycée privé Sainte-Geneviève, majoring in law. He studied in Tania Balachova's ...

as Vincent Malivert *

François Berléand François Berléand (; born 22 April 1952) is a French actor. He plays Gilles Triquet, the officer manager and equivalent of David Brent in ''Le Bureau'', the French version of ''The Office'', produced by Canal+. He also appeared in the 2002 fil ...

as Eric Malivert *

Dragan Nikolić Dragoslav "Dragan" Nikolić ( sr-cyr, Драгослав Драган Николић, ; 20 August 1943 – 11 March 2016) was a Yugoslav and later, Serbian actor. Nikolić studied at Dramatic Arts Academy in Belgrade. In 1967 he starred in the ...

as Janos *

Larry Lamb Lawrence Douglas Lamb (born 1 October 1947) is an English actor and radio presenter. He played Archie Mitchell in the BBC soap opera '' EastEnders'', Mick Shipman in the BBC comedy series ''Gavin & Stacey'' and Ted Case in the final series of ...

as Christopher Makos *

Otto Tausig Otto Tausig (13 February 1922 – 10 October 2011) was an Austrian writer, director and actor. Although he usually appeared in German language films, he also played in English language films such as ''Love Comes Lately'', and in French language fil ...

as Samy * László Szabó as Charlie Rosen * Elisabeth Commelin as Mademoiselle Pierson * Philippe Clévenot as Kleiser *

Malik Zidi Malik Zidi (born 14 February 1975)ifrance.com
is a French film, television and theatre actor. He is a

as Sam's Son *

Éric Ruf Éric Ruf (born 21 May 1969), is a French actor, set designer and theatre director. He appeared in more than thirty films since 1995. He joined the Comédie-Française The Comédie-Française () or Théâtre-Français () is one of the few state ...

as Phillipe Ternece *

Nidal Al-Askhar Nidal Al Achkar (born 1941) is a Lebanese actress and theater director, hailed as "The Grande Dame of Lebanese Theater". Personal life Nidal was born in Dik El Mehdi, Matn District in Mount Lebanon Governorate. She studied at the Royal Academy ...

as Saliha *

Julian Fellowes Julian Alexander Kitchener-Fellowes, Baron Fellowes of West Stafford, (born 17 August 1949) is an English actor, novelist, film director and screenwriter, and a Conservative peer of the House of Lords. He is primarily known as the author of s ...

as Wajman *

Michael Culkin Michael Culkin (born 2 July 1954) is an English theatre, film, and television actor probably best known for his role as Judge Buller in the BBC drama ''Garrow's Law''. He appeared as Rab Butler in the first two seasons of ''The Crown'', in '' ...

as De Beers Man

Reception and critical response

On review aggregator

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, ''Place Vendôme'' holds an approval rating of 85%, based on 20 reviews, and an average rating of 6.6/10. On

Metacritic Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...

, the film has a weighted average score of 74 out of 100, based on 18 critics, indicating "Generally favorable reviews". In the ''New York Times'', David Kehr wrote, "despite its many flaws, the film never loses its focus on its fascinating central figure. Grandly suffering, grandly triumphant or just plain grand, Ms. Deneuve is a spectacle to behold." Lisa Nesselson of the ''

Variety Magazine ''Variety'' is an American media company owned by Penske Media Corporation. The company was founded by Sime Silverman in New York City in 1905 as a weekly newspaper reporting on theater and vaudeville. In 1933 it added ''Daily Variety'', based ...

'' said that the film is "an elaborate and elegant suspenser that gives Catherine Deneuve plenty of leeway to act up a storm, "Place Vendome" features coveted gemstones, the no-nonsense factions that want them and a woman's revised take on her own destiny, played out against luxurious backdrops".

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert (; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American film critic, film historian, journalist, screenwriter, and author. He was a film critic for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. In 1975, Ebert beca ...

gave the film a score of 3.5 out of 5.

References

External links

* * * Films set in Paris Films directed by Nicole Garcia Films shot in Antwerp Films shot in Paris Films produced by Alain Sarde French crime drama films 1998 crime drama films 1998 films 1990s French-language films 1990s French films {{1990s-France-film-stub