The film

Luc Besson had instant success when his first commercial feature film, combining humor and fun with daring arty directional choices like filming it in black and white and avoiding any sort of understandable dialog by means of a plot device depending on post nuclear war symptoms. The protagonist has to fight of a number of less civilized survivors to save his life, that of an old man whom he befriends, and maybe that of all decent humanity of the future. Jean Reno has a magnificent role as a lunatic evader.

The music

The complete score was only released on LP, and this record has become a true rarity. Its existence has long been doubted by many, because so few copies seem to have been pressed, and even those almost never surface on the market anywhere. Even in France where it was originally made and sold this is a very much sought after album.

In 1996 Serra rerecorded two tracks and released them on the compilation CD "La Musique Des Films" (The Soundtracks). Strangely neither of these two tracks features the main theme of the film, that can be heard throughout the rest of the album, and most prominently on the first track of the A side and the last track on the B side.

Serra's first steps into the world of filmscoring pretty much predicted his future style, with use of synths and bass guitar, a few experimental soundscapes, and more than average jazz influences. The funky beats that often drive the music sound very close to Subway, Serra's next work which was definitely very close to this one.