Iconic French chansonnier Charles Aznavour plays Charlie Koller, a seemingly unremarkable pianist in a run-down bar in the slums of Paris. But Charlie’s real name is Edouard Saroyan, formerly a world-famous classical pianist, whose career is in ruins after the suicide of his wife Thérèse. Her suicide triggers a chain of events that brings Charlie to the bottom of the slum and closer to his estranged family – a bunch of real but often incompetent crooks – from which he so desperately tried to escape during his climb to the top.

The story serves as a framework for the film, but often wanders off as Truffaut indulges in scenes that do not advance the plot, but rather reflect the chaotic structure of everyday life. Romantic scenes are alternated with fragments of comic violence, and the familiar elements of B-movie thrillers. The director is clearly out to catch the audience off guard. TIREZ SUR LE PIANISTE ultimately resembles a feverish dream, in which anything can happen, and often does.

The film will be re-released on 12 December, on the occasion of the Dutch release of MONSIEUR AZNAVOUR, a musical biopic about the French chansonnier. (bw)