Fric-Frac (1939)

In Paris, Marcel, a decent young man, is one of the employees at the Mercandieu jewelry shop, located in an apartment on Rue de Turbigo. Renée, the owner’s daughter, dreams of making him her fiancé, but Marcel does not live up to her expectations, much to the young woman’s exasperation. One Sunday afternoon, at a bicycle race at the Buffalo stadium in Montrouge, Marcel meets an exuberant couple with rather shady airs: Jo, a petty criminal accustomed to scams and break-ins, and his partner, the alluring Loulou, whose irresistible charms he falls for immediately. Renée realizes that Marcel seems captivated by his new friends and decides to meet them herself. A romance does indeed seem to be taking shape, but Marcel completely misunderstands Loulou’s intentions, since she already has a partner. In fact, she is the steady girlfriend of a man named Tintin, who is serving time in prison following a burglary. He needs money to make his time inside more comfortable. The young woman, knowing Marcel’s profession, then decides to pull off a jewelry-store robbery at Mercandieu’s with Jo’s help. She uses her charms to wheedle information out of the naive Marcel, who ends up trapped by the two accomplices. Returning to her father’s apartment earlier than expected, Renée catches the burglars in the act. Marcel, who has joined them after managing to free himself, is forced to ask Mr. Mercandieu for Renée’s hand in marriage to keep her from denouncing his “friends.”