Tom Ripley (Alain Delon) is on a mission to bring back playboy Philippe Greenleaf (Maurice Ronet) back to his home in San Fransisco. Philippe, however, has other plans as he galivants through Italy. He invites Tom on a boating trip with himself and Marge (Marie Laforêt), his girlfriend, but as Philippe’s antics grow more and more out of control, Tom begins to make moves to get rid of Philippe and take control of the man’s fortune and assets. 

Released in 1960, Purple Noon was adapted from the Patricia Highsmith novel The Talented Mr. Ripley and adapted for the screen by Paul Gégauff and René Clément, the latter of which would direct the feature for Paris Film. The caper was later remastered and released on home video by The Criterion Collection in 2012. Boasting a tinkering score by Nino Rota and sublime cinematography by Henri Decaë, Purple Noon is an instantly captivating work that showcases not only the beautiful Italian seaside but also Delon – still early in his career – in one of his most stunning and menacing roles. 

At the center of the film, Delon has an endlessly fascinating role as the mimic, mooch, and all-around conman, Tom Ripley. For much of the film, he operates as an enigma and we never quite know what his plan is, but Delon’s skill as an actor and undeniable magnetism on screen keeps us engaged. In a way, Tom fills a femme fatale-esque role in Philippe’s arc of this sun-soaked noir. He is not quite an antihero as his morality serves only himself, but Delon wins us over that we grow agitated as the police begin to grow nearer and nearer to him in the second half of the film. As we watch him work – learning Philippe’s signature and converting his passport – the performance and the entire style of the film feels like a spiritual predecessor to Steven Spielberg‘s Catch Me if You Can (2002) which starred a similarly handsome and young Leonardo DiCaprio in the role of real-life forger Frank Abagnale Jr. 

Where Tom and Frank differ, however, is that Frank is defrauding companies in his string of financially motivated, but otherwise victimless crimes, whereas Tom is a murderer. As the saying goes, a little white lie can quickly snowball, and Tom’s plan to dispose of Philippe proves to be an ever-growing deception that requires Tom to make quick decisions and adjust his plan accordingly. Watching him work his con is incredibly exciting as we see the thought and skill that a lifetime of scamming brings a person, but if there is one thing that Purple Noon is lacking it is an equal – or at least more prominent – display of skill on the side of the law. We never quite know what clues and details the police have on Tom, and while the argument can be made that it is because the film is from Tom’s perspective, as an audience we only ever get to see him slyly escape and have very little sense of the specific danger which he is in during his run-ins with the law.   

Inspector Ricordi (Erno Crisa), who likens himself at one point to a bloodhound with a nose for sniffing out the guilty, has the makings of a formidable foe, but we never get to see much of his police work on screen. There are many thematic reasons possible as to why the film forgoes showing the legwork involved in bringing Tom down in addition to the more practical pacing problems that could have caused the breezy 118-minute thriller to feel bloated and sluggish. One of the thematic reasons that rises to the top is that the film is reinforcing the idea that there is no such thing as a perfect crime and secondly that crime does not pay. We see the amount of work that Tom has put in to pulling off this extended heist, and yet the police are always hot on his trail and ready to bring him down the moment he gets too comfortable.  

While the cat and mouse chase occupies much of the latter half of the film, there is a prominent relationship established in the first half of the film between Tom and Philippe which haunts the second half. They say imitation is the highest form of flattery and early in Purple Noon, we find Tom, elated, as he tries on Philippe’s shoes, tie, and blazer before closing his eyes and kissing himself in the mirror. Just how queer this relationship is is left up for debate, but it is heavily implied through the voyeuristic camera which splits its time away from Delon’s face with his sun-kissed torso and scantily clad crotch, throughout. It is not simply that the film has a fascination with Delon here that lends itself so easily to a queer reading, but it is how specifically Decaë’s camera gives value to the male form, especially when compared to another Delon-led film, Jacques Deray’s La Piscine (1969), which finds the actor in similar states of nudity yet with none of the gay subtexts. Further, by grafting a homosexual desire onto the Tom/Philippe dynamic, it helps add more weight to Tom’s motivation for his crime as money never seems to be the true object of desire. The murder at sea and the taking over of Philippe’s identity, beyond the necessary wrapping up of loose ends, makes much more sense when viewed as a crime of jealousy motivated by a desire to become what Tom cannot have. It is not until he is backed into a corner with no other option that he resolves to shed himself of Philippe completely. 

Purple Noon is a taught thriller that is still wildly accessible some 60 years after its initial release. It has a meaty first act leading up to the kill followed by an intriguing and ever-evolving attempt by the wily Tom to shake the police, Marge, and the Greenleaf family. The film mints Delon as a star, not just for his physical presence on screen but as an actor able to comb the darker recesses and pull out a sinister performance without any of the trappings of traditional villainy assigned to him. Yet still, audiences through the decades fall under his charm no doubt aided by the rich characterization provided by Highsmith, Clément’s methodical direction and, as mentioned, Decaë’s endlessly curious camera, the fusing of all these elements elevates Purple Noon from the realm of schlocky 60’s-era capers to a truly timeless work.