This is not intended to be a run-of-the-mill gangster flick. Note that gangsters are people who commit their crimes and then live the high life in their off-hours. But Jef Costello, the title character, is a contract killer, but we see right away that he has no life out of doing his jobs, smoking cigarettes, living in a shabby apartment with a caged bird, not even having any social life. He even keeps a stony face, except in several moments of the movie where he lets emotions leak through. He is a lone wolf in more ways than one.
He is hired to murder a nightclub owner in his office, and in doing so, is seen by a number of people, including a black woman whom he meets in a hallway. Yet when he and dozens of other possible suspects are arrested (the Parisian police would do all that for one homicide?), a couple of witnesses identify him, but others do not-including the black woman who clearly saw him. He is released, but when he meets his employers for payment, they try and fail to assassinate him. (They later admit to Jef that they mistakenly had thought he was about to betray them.) Jef even returns to the nightclub...the idea being that the witnesses there deliberately turned a blind eye to his action. The police try to press potential witnesses to no avail, probably because the police are not entirely sympathetic themselves. (This movie was made just before the 1968 Paris riots after all.) This is meant to be an existentialist, artistic movie, and it is not entirely clear why Jef does as he does. The abrupt ending only serves to add to the confusion.
He is hired to murder a nightclub owner in his office, and in doing so, is seen by a number of people, including a black woman whom he meets in a hallway. Yet when he and dozens of other possible suspects are arrested (the Parisian police would do all that for one homicide?), a couple of witnesses identify him, but others do not-including the black woman who clearly saw him. He is released, but when he meets his employers for payment, they try and fail to assassinate him. (They later admit to Jef that they mistakenly had thought he was about to betray them.) Jef even returns to the nightclub...the idea being that the witnesses there deliberately turned a blind eye to his action. The police try to press potential witnesses to no avail, probably because the police are not entirely sympathetic themselves. (This movie was made just before the 1968 Paris riots after all.) This is meant to be an existentialist, artistic movie, and it is not entirely clear why Jef does as he does. The abrupt ending only serves to add to the confusion.