The Brain

Le Cerveau (The Brain, 1969) is a French crime comedy you can watch online on iFILM — directed by Gérard Oury and stacked with an unlikely cast. Jean-Paul Belmondo and Bourvil play Arthur and Anatole, two small-time crooks who hatch a plan to rob an armoured railcar travelling from Paris to Brussels. What they don't know is that a sleek international master thief known only as The Brain — played by David Niven at his most unruffled — has the exact same target. Eli Wallach's American mob rounds out the competition.

Three separate crews spend the film tripping over each other in escalating chaos, and that collision is where all the comedy lives. Belmondo is at full speed, Bourvil does his trademark baffled warmth, and Niven is perfectly cast as the man who considers panic beneath him. Shot on location across Paris and Brussels, the film has the kind of sharp tailoring and NATO-money stakes that make it a genuine time capsule of late-60s European cinema — fun at any pace. Stream Le Cerveau (1969) on iFILM.