Série noire

In the dilapidated Parisian suburbs, a down-on-his-luck door-to-door salesman (Patrick Dewaere, Themroc) is appalled when a potential customer casually pimps out her teenage niece (Marie Trintingant) to him in exchange for a dressing gown. Enraged, he becomes determined to set the girl free by any means necessary, providing a catalyst for a spiral of escalating violence, robbery, and murder. Serie Noire, co-written by Corneau and novelist Georges Perec and based on Jim Thompson’s novel A Hell of a Woman, is regarded as possibly the best screen realisation of Thompson’s uniquely bleak and gruesomely comic noir aesthetic, powered by an infamously physical and committed lead performance from Dewaere.

SPECIAL FEATURES

• High definition digital transfer

• Uncompressed mono PCM audio
  
  
• Interviews with Alain Corneau, Patrick Dewaere and Miriam Boyer from Belgian Television (1981, 11 mins)
  
  
• Série noire: The Darkness of the Soul - An archival documentary featuring cast and crew on the making of the film (2013, 53 mins)
  
• Archival interview with Alain Corneau and Marie Trintignant (2002, 29 mins)
  
  
• A Hollyhock in a Cornfield - A visual essay about Jim Thompson adaptations for the screen by Paul Martinovic (2024, 30 mins)
  
  
• Trailer
  
  

• Newly improved English subtitle translation

Série noire is also available in USA/Canada from our partners MVD, Diabolik, Orbit, Grindhouse, Rough Cut Canada and others

Year: 1979
Country: France
Cert: 15
Format: Blu-ray
Region: AB
RAD098BD
EAN: 5060974681891
Release date: 20/07/2026

Press for Série noire:

"The film’s greatest achievement as a monumentally misanthropic film noir is embracing Thompson’s playful sense of spite" - Slant

"Alain Corneau and screenwriter Georges Perec display as strong a feel for the novelist’s bleak worldview as can be found in the many films derived from his work. An enticingly nasty little crime film… ripe for rediscovery" - Hollywood Reporter

"A satisfying slice of sleaze served up on celluloid, Série Noire is a deliciously good watch." - Film Inquiry