A blow dart-wielding thug snatches a rare statuette from the Musee de l'Homme; anthropologist Jean Servais (Rififi) is kidnapped in broad Parisian daylight; serviceman Jean-Paul Belmondo begins his 8-day leave by changing to civvies in a Metro entrance and witnesses fiancee Francoise Dorleac (Catherine Deneuve's sister, killed in a car accident 3 years later) getting kidnapped herself - and then the chase begins: by motorcycle, shoe leather, flight to Rio de Janeiro sans ticket or passport, airport baggage carrier, cable car, pink car complete with green stars and a rumble seat, water skies, Amazon river boat, seaplane, jungle vine... all shot in breathtaking widescreen and color. Even as Dorleac, rescued, is kidnapped again, Belmondo performs his own blood-curdling stunts against that sugar loaf Rio skyline and across that under-construction unearthly architecture of Brasilia (even parachuting almost into the jaws of a hungry croc).
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