Confidentially Yours

The final film from Francois Truffaut is a very interesting one. The film Confidentially Yours (1983) is a pure film noir, done magnificently in black and white and uses almost every tool in the book. To watch this film, you know Truffaut was probably having a good time with this.
After a man named Massoulier is murdered while hunting, real estate agent Julien Vercel (Jean-Louis Trintignant) is the prime suspect. Soon after that, Vercel's wife is murdered and his guilt seems even more evident. All hope for Vercel seems lost until his trusty secretary Barbara (Fanny Ardant) comes to his aide. Using every trick she knows, Barbara stops at nothing to find the killer who framed her boss, leading to a surprise ending.
This film is a delight to watch. It is filled with excellent moments with Ardant and Trintignant. The film holds a very complex and mixed up plot, very reminiscent of Howard Hawks' The Big Sleep and has that kind of energetic and quirky mix that Robert Altman displayed in The Long Goodbye. The film itself seems like it could be a Philip Marlowe mystery, with Fanny Ardant playing a very sexy version of Marlowe. Never has a raincoat been sexier when Fanny Ardant wears it.
Francois Truffaut's love for the cinema has never been more evident here. Going back to the American films that he admired so much and using all the tools that Welles, Hawks, Lang, and Hitchcock used in their film noirs. In Truffaut's films it was more about perfecting the cinema than changing it altogether. It was about putting the right actors in the right roles and Fanny Ardant feels comfortable as the tough, yet vulnerable secretary and Jean-Louis Trintignant is perfect as the real estate agent that tries to prove he has been set-up. These are not flashy actor personalities but they fit their parts perfectly.
As far as the condition of this film on DVD, it seems that there might be a Criterion release on the horizon since this film is on their HuluPlus channel: http://www.hulu.com/watch/265804/confidentially-yours. This film was already on laserdisc for the Criterion so maybe they will give this film a blu-ray/DVD release sometime soon. If you are desperate to have this film on DVD, a Region 1 release is availble on: http://www.amazon.com/Confidentially-Yours-Fanny-Ardant/dp/B00000IBQ0/ref=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1329287423&sr=1-1, for $40.00 new and $7.04 used.
This is a great film from Francois Truffaut and definitely needs to be seen by any true Truffaut. It is not his best film but is definitely a delight to watch.