User Reviews

Saw this on the UK Talking Pictures channel, (old films & tv) though I'd seen it when they first came out. I find myself in the unusual situation of veering towards the Sir-Oblong-Fitzblob review on this one, as it seemed that some part of the script got omitted somewhere, the episode needed a bit more time and they just didn't have it?

Some of Simenon's books are like this, it takes a while for Maigret to shake the characters around to reveal some weaknesses, and gradually bring the truth into the light. BUT - in this one, he only had limited chances to shake anything, one chap wouldn't speak to anyone, another just smirked (until getting bumped off), and the wealthy 'Lord of the Manor' (actually, of the Canal in this case!), would only reveal tiny snippets of the truth, mixed in with a lot of blustering about the failures of his family, and women in general.

There was indeed some nice location filming, which one reviewer helpfully identifies, but there was no forensic clue, just Maigret trying to get significance from the odd remark that didn't gel.

I also thought the plot failed elsewhere, as there had been a suicide, with a note discovered, later said to have been written by someone else, to 'muddy the waters', but unless I nodded off for a crucial minute or two, that didn't get properly resolved. I'm still a fan of the series, and the star, but this episode was a barge with dodgy steering and a leak?

A terrific episode produced and directed by Rudolph Cartier (of Quatermass and 1984 fame). There is an extravagant amount of filming around the Ecluse de Janville, a canal lock at Longueil-Annel (north-east of Paris), and latterly on the Seine, and there's a strong central performance by guest star Francis de Wolfe as a womanising but charismatic lock "patron", whom Maigret can't help warming to. PM.

Ducrau is a larger than life character. Owner of some barges that travel down the Parisian rivers.

Ducrau is attacked one night but her survives. Ducrau does not know who attacked him or why.

Later his son commits suicide and dark family secrets are unearthed.

Watching Maigret in weekly instalments. The stories seem to merge into one. Dark family secrets, illegitimate children. A larger than life father figure, a floozy here and there.

This episode has extensive footage of Parisian locations and barges going down the river. I figured that they needed the padding.

What do you do when you have bunged Simenon a hefty wadge of ChFr for the rights to a meagre jumble of ludicrously implausible characters joined by a scrappy pseudo socially aware plot and you have 50 minutes to fill?

You take endless feet of film of barges and locks, bung another wadge to Gabriel de Woolf to do his big looming bad lad act, and hope that the audience is sufficiently embarrassed at the paucity of dramatic fluency, and dearth of plausible characterization to not mention it.

The Jukebox Jury klaxon is feeling a bit overworked on this one.