Robert (Daniel Gélin), an itinerant painter passing through Monte Carlo, saves the life of uber-rich drunk Eric Fréminger (Peter van Eyck) late one night and the man offers Robert a job as his companion-cum- chauffeur, much to the displeasure of his icy, elegant wife Hélène (Michèle Morgan). When Fréminger isn't playing sadistic mind games with Hélène, he's either blotto or busy going bankrupt and he tells Hélène she'll only have a couple of hours after he blows his brains out to make the dirty deed look like murder if she wants to collect on a sizable life insurance policy. Fréminger immediately makes good on his threat and after a quick tête-à-tête, Hélène and Robert agree to take the dead man's advice and hide his body in a walk-in freezer until they can come up with a plan. They begin by hiring a pretty young maid (Michèle Mercier) to convince her that the master of the house is a recluse who won't come out of his room but "oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive..."
A deliciously cold-blooded, sexy French noir based on a James Hadley Chase pulp thriller that took its lead from Cornell Woolrich's "The Black Path Of Fear". Woolrich's version first saw the light of day as THE CHASE in 1946 (also starring Michèle Morgan, interestingly enough) but, as usual with J.H. Chase, there's more than enough variational surprises to allow a "twisted sister" to stand on its own and THERE'S ALWAYS A PRICE TAG does just that. A thoroughly jaundiced eye is cast on human nature and Morgan (platinum blonde here a la DOUBLE INDEMNITY's Phyllis Dietrichson) chills to the marrow as the devastating, driven femme fatale. The estimable character actor Bernard Blier is also pitch-perfect as a police inspector who's a bit smarter than he lets on. Cynical and satisfying.
A deliciously cold-blooded, sexy French noir based on a James Hadley Chase pulp thriller that took its lead from Cornell Woolrich's "The Black Path Of Fear". Woolrich's version first saw the light of day as THE CHASE in 1946 (also starring Michèle Morgan, interestingly enough) but, as usual with J.H. Chase, there's more than enough variational surprises to allow a "twisted sister" to stand on its own and THERE'S ALWAYS A PRICE TAG does just that. A thoroughly jaundiced eye is cast on human nature and Morgan (platinum blonde here a la DOUBLE INDEMNITY's Phyllis Dietrichson) chills to the marrow as the devastating, driven femme fatale. The estimable character actor Bernard Blier is also pitch-perfect as a police inspector who's a bit smarter than he lets on. Cynical and satisfying.