Lucky Jo

Lucky Jo is a French crime film released in 1964 and directed by Michel Deville. Eddie Constantine, the American-born star known for tough-guy parts in French cinema, takes the lead, supported by the veteran character actor Pierre Brasseur and Christiane Minazzoli. Georges Wilson, Jean-Pierre Darras, Anouk Ferjac and Claude Brasseur round out the ensemble. Nina Companéez, Michel Deville and Pierre Lesou wrote the screenplay together, drawing on Lesou's background in crime fiction. The roughly ninety-minute picture follows a mobster so dogged by misfortune that his bad luck has become his trademark in the underworld. Made early in Deville's directing career, it belongs to the French gangster-film tradition of the 1960s and approaches its policier framework with an undercurrent of dark humor.