Lemmy Caution - Film Adaptations

Film Adaptations

Bernard Borderie had the chance to produce the first French adaption. He was searching for somebody who had the looks of a gangster, and picked Eddie Constantine, who was already known as a singer. So far he had merely played one supporting role in a film of the very same year and his lack of experience as an actor is rather obvious, even without comparing La môme vert-de-gris to his later films. However, he really started through as an actor. Audiences liked his personality, and that led to a whole series of films with "Lemmy Caution".

Lemmy Caution was portrayed as a witty, crafty womanizer who never hesitated to do what he considered appropriate. When playing Lemmy Caution, Eddie Constantine often approached pretty ladies with a glass of whisky in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

Many people mixed up Lemmy Caution and Eddie Constantine. Constantine would never be able to remedy this mix-up. Neither has it ever been reported that anybody had tried to succeed Constantine as Lemmy Caution.

The film adaptions of Peter Cheyney's book showed Lemmy Caution as an optimistic strong man who would even be a winner when he was totally outnumbered. So it came as a shock for many fans when they watched Eddie Constantine's interpretation of Lemmy Caution in Alphaville. Here he was a tired, aged and depressive-looking man clad in a trenchcoat like once had Humphrey Bogart, spaced out and lost in a future world.

Lemmy Caution returned later on several times as a cameo in German feature films like Udo Lindenberg's Panische Zeiten (Panic Times) and others.

In 1988 there was also a French film called Le retour de Lemmy Caution with Lemmy Caution once again as main character but this Lemmy Caution was far away from Peter Cheyney's vision.

Lemmy Caution films

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• La môme vert de gris (1953) English Title: Poison Ivy
• Cet homme est dangereux (1953) English Title: This Man is Dangerous
• Les femmes s'en balancent (1954) English Title: Dames Get Along
• Vous pigez? (1955) English Title: Diamond Machine
• Comment qu'elle est! (1960) English Title: Women Are Like That
• Lemmy pour les dames (1962) English Title: Ladies' Man
• À toi de faire... mignonne (1963) English Title: Your Turn, Darling
• Alphaville, une étrange aventure de Lemmy Caution (1965)