Rififi

Rififi is famous for a long jewelry-store burglary staged with almost no dialogue or music. Jules Dassin lets the tension come from tools, timing, silence, and the risk of a single sound.

Dassin was an American director who had been blacklisted during the Hollywood Red Scare. He made the 1955 French noir in Paris, where it became one of his most celebrated films.

Tony le Stephanois is the aging criminal played by Jean Servais. He comes out of prison and joins a planned jewel robbery, but the aftermath turns the heist into a revenge tragedy.

The French title Du rififi chez les hommes uses slang that roughly suggests trouble, rough stuff, or underworld conflict among men. That fits the film's move from a precise robbery to betrayal and gang violence.