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Credits
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Summary
When a disfigured body of a woman is found in the lodgings of Dr Chaleck, Inspector Juve
immediately suspects this to be the work of his arch-enemy, the master criminal Fantômas.
He and his journalist friend, Fandor, trail Chaleck across Paris. They see him being
handed a note by a girl called Joséphine whom Fandor pursues while Juve continues
following Chaleck. Joséphine is the lover of Martialle, an employee of a
distillery company who is taking a large sum of money by train as part of a business deal.
Fandor follows them onto the train where he and Martialle are robbed by Fantômas
and his gang. They narrowly avoid being casualties in a horrific train crash. Fantômas
sends a telegram to Juve, purporting to be from Fandor, to lure him to the distillery.
Informed by Martialle, Fandor has gone there himself. He and Juve fire shots at
each other by mistake, before being caught in a violent ambush. After another lucky
escape, Juve and Fandor return to Paris and decide to pay a visit to Lady Bentham’s
former house. Having heard rumours that the house is haunted, they decide to hold
a vigil one night. To their surprise, Lady Bentham returns to the house to meet
her one-time lover Fantômas. They overhear Fantômas saying that he intends
to dispose of Juve in three days’ time, sending a silent executioner to kill him
in his sleep…
Review
The second instalment in Louis Feuillade’s five-part Fantômas serial sees
a substantial shift towards the more familiar action thriller, making this a spectacular
contrast to the first film in the series. Although perhaps less atmospheric and
menacing than the first film, Juve contre Fantômas has other pleasures, most notably
the rapid sequence of action scenes. Within minutes of escaping a terrible train
disaster, our heroes are fighting for their lives amidst a raging inferno at a distillery,
and more is to come!
The characters of Juve and Fantômas are also more fully developed and it is clear that what is developing is a bitter fight to the death. Less spectre-like and abstract than in the first film, Fantômas is now revealed to be a dangerous, fully-fledged villain, thoroughly consumed by evil. The relentless pace of this film is quite breathtaking, and is quite remarkable that Feuillade had achieved such a mastery of the suspense thriller so long before Hitchcock and other masters of the genre, and with comparatively primitive film-making technology. The film ends with a truly brilliant cliff-hanger which provides an irresistible inducement to watch the next thrilling instalment in the series. © James Travers 2001
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