Daniel Cauchy wears an unidentified watch

Bob le Flambeur is Jean-Pierre Melville's 1956 study of an aging Montmartre gambler who pulls a crew together to rob the casino at Deauville. In the dark hours before the job, parked on the coast, Bob's men check the time before peeling off into separate cars. The watch on Paolo's wrist is a round piece with a pale dial and a small seconds register at six o'clock, worn on a dark leather strap. Melville frames it in tight black and white and no maker's name is legible on the dial, so it stays unidentified, a plain mid-1950s dress watch of the kind a young accomplice would actually own. The frame is preserved here as evidence in case a sharper eye can place it.