小偷

Piccoli and Schneider teamed up for two of Claude Sautet's best films"les choses de la vie" and"Max et les ferrailleurs" and finally Jacques Rouffio's" la passante du sans-souci" which ,sadly,was to be Schneider's last part."La voleuse" which is the earliest of their collaborations has fallen into oblivion.Although directed by a French,the action takes place in Germany and ,with the exception of Piccoli,the actors are all German (like Schneider herself) Although based on a melodramatic screenplay,this effort is rather austere filmed in a bleak black and white with a strange use of the wide screen:during the cast and credits ,at the beginning,Schneider mumbles words which the music drowns out and we only understand her last words.We think she is in a shrink's office but she's actually talking with her husband.When she was nineteen ,she gave birth to a child who was taken in by another family.And now she wants her child again,and with the help of the Police,she"steals"(hence the title:= the thief)her boy from his foster parents .The adoptive father is not prepared to accept it and he threatens to commit suicide .The film is rather undistinguished but it has become poignant when you know Romy Schneider's awful fate:she lost her own child and died two years later.With hindsight,"la voleuse" was a frightening omen.