Frost on the skin (film, 1963)

Two friends, Daniel Boisset ( Robert Ossein ) and Paul Gene ( Jean Sorel ), work in a safe factory in Paris, deciding to rob a safe of one of their clients. They enter his apartment and open the safe. At this moment, the landlord unexpectedly returns with his wife and enters into a fight with the robbers. He attacks Daniel, Paul beats him in the back with a statuette on the head and, as it turns out later, this blow turns out to be fatal. Daniel runs out through the main entrance and stumbles upon a policeman who wounds his leg and delays, and Paul manages to escape. At the trial, Daniel does not tell anything about Paul, and on charges of attempting to rob and murder, he gets twenty years in prison. Approximately a year after the robbery, during transport at the railway station, he manages to remove himself from the handcuffs and escape. Daniel gets to the southern coast of France, where he meets the owner of a gas station and a small car repair shop, an elderly and good-natured Tom ( Georges Wilson ). Daniel explains to him that he was robbed, having stolen all the money and documents. Tom's business is not particularly thriving, but, seeing how well Daniel understands the technique and, getting to him with personal sympathy, he gives him a job in a car repair shop and a small guest house for living. Tom introduces Daniel to his young wife Maria ( Catherine Ruvel ), a former waitress who married Tom, hoping to take over her husband’s money. Having settled in a new place, Daniel calls Paul in Paris and asks him to come and help him make new documents. Meanwhile, Maria accidentally notices in the newspaper information about the search for Daniel, who is presented as a dangerous safe cracker and killer who escaped. She decides to use Daniel in her plan to steal her husband's money. Blackmailing Daniel by telling the police about him and at the same time seducing him, Maria forces Daniel to open the safe in which Toma keeps her considerable savings. When Toma leaves for a meeting with brother-soldiers, Daniel opens the safe, but at this moment, due to bad weather, Tom suddenly returns home and finds Maria and Daniel at the open safe. Toma realizes that Maria has come up with a plan of robbery, and pounces on her, she shoots from a previously stored gun, killing him on the spot. Since neither Maria nor Daniel are interested in the appearance of the police, they decide to get rid of the body, explaining Tom’s disappearance by the fact that he went along the coast to find a new bus station. Daniel buries Tom's body in a car repair shop. Maria persuades Daniel to re-open the safe, take the money and run, but Daniel believes that if they do, the police will quickly figure them out and catch them. Maria now can not fully blackmail Daniel, as he took a pistol from which a fatal shot was made, with her fingerprints. At this moment Paul arrives to help Daniel arrange new documents. Upon learning that Paul is also a safe deposit box specialist, Maria seduces him too, hoping that he will open a safe for her instead of Daniel. Paul initially refuses, not wanting to intervene in this suspicious business, but then realizing that this is a lot of money, he agrees to open the safe for half of them. Meanwhile, one of Tom's distant relatives, an angry and greedy old man, comes to the station, whose dog finds a piece of fresh land, where Daniel has buried his body. Thinking that Tom’s treasures are buried there, a relative offers to dig and divide them, but Daniel flatly refuses and exposes him from home. The next time this relative comes along with a healthy son and a weapon, and while he is keeping Daniel at gunpoint, his son is digging in a car repair shop. However, Daniel manages to splash a relative in the face with burning oil and grab a gun. There is a shootout, during which Daniel wounds his son, and his son wounds him. Meanwhile, Maria and Paul are returning from the city, they bandage Daniel and put him into bed. Paul sends Maria to the city for medicines for Daniel, and he goes to the safe, opens it and puts the money in the bag. At this moment Maria appears, who was expecting such an act from Paul and just waited in ambush when he finally opened the safe to take possession of the money. She pulls out a gun, demanding to give her all the money, but Paul kills her, takes a bag with money and intends to escape by car. Meanwhile, Tom's burned relative is turned to the hospital, and from there comes a signal to the police. Police put up a cordon on the road, hoping to cut Daniel to the road to escape. Paul, by car with money, stumbles upon this cordon, turns around and drives in the opposite direction, pursued by the police, who is firing at his car. In the toga he gets wounded, loses consciousness, crashes into the gas dispenser. An explosion occurs, as a result of which both Paul and money perish. A fire breaks out at the station, followed by a wounded Daniel.

Robert Hossein - Daniel Boisset

Catherine Ruvel - Maria

Jean Sorel - Paul Wien

Georges Wilson - Toma

• "Frost on the skin" (English) on the Internet Movie Database  
• Frost on the skin (English) on the site allmovie