Exactly what I imagined it'd be - solid Frankenheimer craft meeting sordid pulp by Leonard which has nothing else to it, and no far reaching ideas. Typical American marriage story meets blackmail, sin and bullets.

I had to rewatch it because I still can't get my head around the colors, and the tone that Friedkin gets into this film out of Dafoe's performance. A pulp sensation, driven by misanthropy, the film is a dark, deadly sexualization of the depths that one descends to.

As good as Rozier is here formally with some great staging, especially the dance on the beach, this basically comes across as an unintentional look at men being terrible to women out on the streets. Rozier shows young boys indulging in harassment under the guise of flirting and it isn't easy to watch such idiots on screen, especially with Rozier's non judgmental document of their actions. Early nouvelle vague that gives a clear indication of what the 60s were going to be in French cinema.