Jean-Paul Belmondo wears a Panerai Luminor

In 1963, Jean-Paul Belmondo played the young drifter in Jean-Pierre Melville's L'Aîné des Ferchaux, adapted from the Georges Simenon novel. Thirty-eight years later he returned to the story for Bernard Stora's 2001 television version, this time in the older role, the banker Ferchaux himself, fleeing France ahead of the law. Samy Naceri took the young man's part that Belmondo had once played as a newcomer. The role reversal is the remake's reason for being.

Belmondo was a longtime Panerai wearer, and photographs from around this period show him in a black-dialed Luminor. The Panerai enthusiast site Jake's Panerai World, which connected the watch to L'Aîné des Ferchaux, guessed it was a Luminor Submersible, reference PAM00024, while stopping short of certainty. No clear still from the film has surfaced to pin down the exact watch on Ferchaux's wrist, so it stays a Panerai Luminor.