Poule Haul

How Not to Rob a Department Store. It is Dec. 24 at the Galeries Lafayette department store in Paris. Into the throng of late shoppers come two colossally inept hoods (Jean-Claude Brialy, Albert Remy), intent on hijacking 100 million francs from the cashier's office. Straight off, they discover that they have forgotten to bring tools. Detouring to "basement hardware," they lose more time through a plumbing mishap, Santa's payday and a jammed elevator--then, none too brilliantly, bring off the heist. A couple of minutes later, they lose the cash to a teen gang that has been holding up a tiny dry goods shop down the street.

On New Year's Day, their swag recovered, the thieves flee to a suburban hideout with the 100 million and a doe-eyed poule, impishly played by Marie Laforet. Accidentally glued together in transit, the franc notes must be washed and ironed, Marie decrees. Her laundry is only half done, festooning every square inch of space, when someone notices that gendarmes have surrounded the villa--not to reclaim the clean lucre, after all, but to capture a wild bull in the garden. Though Department Store follows the perennial Rififi formula, Director Pierre Grimblat has wrapped up an ingenious package of Sennett slapstick, Gallic gaiety and bits of Yuletide foolery that deserves to outlast the tinsel and snow.

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