Les Gaspards (1974)

Jean-Paul Rondin (Michel Serrault) is a bookseller in Paris, near the Panthéon. He is unhappy because his shop is located near a city-renovation site ordered by the Minister of Public Works (Charles Denner). One evening, Rondin’s daughter (Chantal Goya) suddenly disappears after leaving her group of friends. Commissioner Lalatte (Michel Galabru), whom Rondin has gone to see, thinks she has run away. Rondin decides to conduct his own investigation and explore the underground passages of Paris. The disappearance of around twenty tourists who had come to visit the catacombs—including a young American named Nixon, whose surname was the same as that of the U.S. president at the time—finally prompts Lalatte to act, especially as, at the same time, objects are disappearing from museums and food is being stolen from the cellars or basements of local shopkeepers. In fact, it is the work of a militant group from the hippie movement, “the Gaspards” (a slang term meaning “the rats”), who live beneath Paris. Led by their chief, Gaspard de Montfermeil (Philippe Noiret), they have kidnapped these people so that the construction work will stop and the minister will give in.