Quartile rating: 7.5/10 · 1 rating
French military man Adrien Dufourquet gets an eight-day furlough to visit his fiancée, Agnès. But when he arrives in Paris, he learns that her late father's partner, museum curator Professor Catalan, has just been kidnapped by a group of Amazon tribesmen who have also stolen a priceless statue from the museum. Adrien and Agnès pursue the kidnappers to Brazil, where they learn that the statue is the key to a hidden Amazon treasure.
That Man from Rio is a genuinely singular piece of 1960s adventure filmmaking — a breathless, globe-trotting romp that blends Tintin-esque episodic energy with Bond-era spectacle and screwball comedy in a way that feels utterly its own. Belmondo's physicality is remarkable and the film's relentless kinetic pace across Paris, Rio, Brasília, and the Amazon gives it a distinctive verve that clearly inspired Raiders of the Lost Ark. The plot is cheerfully propulsive but structurally thin — essentially a string of set pieces held together by McGuffin logic. Acting is charming rather than deep. Cinematography captures the locations with flair but isn't especially artful by the standards of the era. The ending wraps things up satisfactorily if without great surprise. Its Novelty is its strongest suit — few films of any era achieve quite this specific cocktail of wit, physical comedy, and adventure geography.