Chapter 7 (Lupin; Part 3)

Chapter 7 is the seventh and final episode of the third part of the Netflix series Lupin, and the seventeenth episode overall.

Synopsis
A family reunion years in the making comes to pass. With Mariama's help, Assane makes a final play to stop Keller, right his wrongs and go out in style.

1998
On the day of the World Cup final between France and Brazil, Keller brings Assane and Bruno to the jewelry store that he intends to have them rob. Assane tries to talk Keller out of the scheme, telling him that the store owners never did them any harm. Keller grabs Assane by the collar and informs him that if he and Bruno don’t do as he says, he will not protect them from social services any longer.

Assane and Bruno quietly sneak into the store. The receptionist fails to notice, as his eyes are glued to the screen of a television which is playing the soccer match. Assane manages to open a safe in the storage area, and he and Bruno help themselves to the expensive items inside it. After completing the theft, Assane and Bruno dash out of the store, triggering its alarm system, and get into Keller’s getaway Jeep.

Keller speeds away in a highly aggressive manner, screaming at Bruno and Assane to show him what they have collected from the store. Assane pleads with Keller to slow the car down, while Bruno hastily shows Keller the jewels. Keller is outraged upon discovering that Assane and Bruno have failed to retrieve a set of emeralds that he had coveted, and berates them angrily.

A police officer on a motorcycle appears behind Keller’s Jeep, sounding its alarm. Keller attempts to throw the officer off course, to no avail. He tells Bruno to open the car’s glovebox, which contains a handgun, and orders him to shoot the police officer. Bruno is horrified refuses, but Keller asserts that he will kill him if he does follow his orders. Assane urges Bruno not to listen to Keller, who continues demanding that Bruno fire at the policeman. In distress, Bruno points the gun out the window; Assane tries to knock his hand away, but the gun goes off and kills the officer. Seconds later, Keller accidentally hits a parked car; the resulting crash sends the Jeep flying through the air. It flips over twice before coming to a stop, upside-down.

In the backseat of the car, Assane is covered in cuts and scrapes, but is not seriously injured. He escapes out of the Jeep’s shattered rear window and finds Bruno lying in the passenger’s seat in a state of shock. Assane drags Bruno out of the car and asks him if he is all right. On the verge of tears, Bruno repeatedly mutters that the police officer’s death was an accident. Assane takes the gun from Bruno and places it into the hand of a near-comatose Keller, who is still lying in the car. Together, Assane and Bruno flee the scene as a squadron of police officers, led by Gabriel Dumont, arrive and arrest Keller.

Assane makes his way to a pub, where the patrons are too busy celebrating France’s impending victory in the World Cup final to notice his bloodied state. He uses the pub’s phone to place a call to Claire, telling her that she was right about Keller, and that he is in serious trouble. He informs her that he is going to run away, and asks her to come with him.

Having agreed to accompany Assane, Claire waits for him at the Gare de l’Est. When he arrives, the two kiss in anticipation of their adventure.

Present day
Upon hearing the alarm, Claire and Raoul hide in a closet. Keller punches the alarm out and slowly moves through the various rooms of the apartment, searching for his prey. Despite her terror, Claire thinks quickly and uses her cell phone to call her home phone, allowing the answering machine to pick up a message that suggests that neither she nor Raoul are at home, and that Raoul’s fictional “Uncle Martin” will be arriving from the police station in a few minutes. Keller is fooled, and leaves the apartment.

Following their reunion, Assane brings Mariama back to his hideout. The next morning, Assane asks Mariama to tell him why she didn’t come to France with him and Babakar in the 1990s. Mariama tearfully explains that in 1995, she had been working in a textile factory in Senegal, and had saved nearly enough money to join her family. However, her employer abruptly decided to halve his workers’ salaries. When Mariama complained, she was fired; in response she decided to steal the difference, but was arrested. When she was released from jail, she had no prospects, and decided to become a thief much in the same way that Assane had.

The conversation is interrupted when Assane receives a phone call from Claire, who asks him to pick her and Raoul up. Assane expresses bemusement when Claire addresses him by name, but Claire tells him that she knows he and “Alex” are the same person, and begs him to hurry. Assane finds Claire and Raoul cowering in the doorway to their apartment building. When they see him, they are overjoyed and run to him, and the newly reunited family shares an emotional embrace. Assane brings Claire and Raoul back with him; Claire gasps in delight upon finally witnessing Assane’s hideout, while Raoul admires his father’s collection of Arsène Lupin books. Claire and Raoul are both shocked and delighted when Assane introduces Mariama to them.

Some time later, Assane reads an article about Thierry Floron, the minister of the interior, when he is accosted by Mariama and Claire, who playfully demand to know what he is reading. Assane tells them that if he finds a way to pressure Floron, he will be able to get anyone he wants out of prison. Mariama chides Assane and tells him that she and Claire have agreed that they will use legal means in order to free Benjamin, and afterward that they will all leave Paris together. Assane tells them that he needs to arrange a few things, and that they will depart in two days’ time.

In disguise as “Ali Abdelkarim,” an officer in the Chadian army, Assane visits the home of French former colonel François de Criqui, telling him that he was one of his young guides when François had served in Africa in 1969. Not realizing that Assane is lying, François welcomes him warmly, and bring him along to a gala that is being hosted by Floron at the Élysée Palace in honor of French military veterans.

As Floron prepares to address the guests, Assane steals away and heads towards Floron’s office. He is stopped by a suspicious security guard, but the guard is immediately forced to leave in order to deal with a server (actually Mariama in disguise) who has dropped a tray of drinks on the ground. Assane enters the office, locks the door behind him, and begins rummaging through Floron’s files. He finds a decoy chest of drawers that turns out to be a safe, and breaks it open, finding a phone.

The security guard returns and, realizing that Assane is inside the office, rushes to alert his colleagues that there is an intruder on the premises. Assane sneaks out the back door as Mariama quietly enters through the front and steals the phone from the safe. The two meet up in the palace courtyard and head down to the underground passagways below the palace, where Assane seats Mariama behind him on a jet ski he had previously stolen. They ride off together before they can be caught by the security staff.

In his office, a highly stressed Floron receives a call from Assane on the stolen phone. Assane tells Floron that he has found a number of questionable contacts on the phone, including nationalists, smugglers and other criminals. Floron is horrified and offers to pay Assane off, but Assane instead requests that Manon be released from prison.

When Manon walks free, she is almost immediately jumped by Assane, who covers her mouth with his hand and tells her that if she screams they will both be caught. Manon asks Assane what he wants, and Assane entreats her to assist him in trapping Keller. Manon scoffs and asks Assane if he understands what loyalty is, accusing him of betraying his family. In response, Assane explains the full truth of what had happened on the day of the 1998 World Cup final. He tells Manon that Keller took advantage of him and Bruno under the guise of protecting them, and suggests that he has been doing the same to her. Although conflicted, Manon agrees to turn on Keller. At Assane’s behest, she calls Keller and tells him that she has found a buyer for the black pearl, and that they will meet at the Arc de Triomphe.

Back at his hideout, Assane makes veal stew for his family, informing Claire and Raoul that it was his father’s favorite dish. He tells them that they will depart Paris the following day, and that they will finally be free. After Claire, Raoul and Mariama have gone to bed, Assane briefly watches them sleep with a sad expression, before leaving.

Guédira receives a message on his cell phone, consisting of a picture of the Arc de Triomphe and the word “Grimaudan.” The word turns out to be Arsène Lupin’s alias in the story of the black pearl. Guédira immediately calls Belkacem and attempts to explain why this means that Assane will be at the Arc de Triomphe with the black pearl. Belkacem is skeptical, but ultimately agrees to meet up with Guédira at the site.

At the top of the Arc de Triomphe, Keller looks for Manon amidst the crowd of tourists. He is surprised when he sees Assane standing nearby. Assane tells Keller that Manon has betrayed him; Keller swings his fist at Assane, but Assane is more agile and steps out of his way. He informs Keller that he has contacted the police. Keller angrily blames Assane for his lengthy prison sentence; Assane responds by accusing Keller of taking advantage of him and Bruno. He instructs Keller to give him the pearl, asserting that Keller will remain out of jail if he does so.

Keller thinks for a moment before dropping the pearl into Assane’s hand and making a run for the exit. However, before he can get there, a squadron of police officers led by Belkacem and Guédira storms up the stairs, to the shock of the tourists. Keller tells Belkacem that Assane has the pearl, but Belkacem arrests him anyway due to his attempted murder of Ferdinand. Assane, meanwhile, places the pearl into a rose and gives it to a pair of tourists, telling them that he has been stood up and that it would be a shame for the rose to go to waste.

As the two tourists descend the stairs of the Arc de Triomphe, they are stopped by Bruno, who inquires whether they were recently stopped by a man fitting Assane’s description. Bruno tells them that he was Assane’s date, and asks them if he can have the rose in order to return it as an apology. The tourists acquiesce, and Bruno leaves with the rose and the pearl. He and Manon later team up to sell it, and re-open Keller’s boxing gym with an Arsène Lupin-inspired theme.

While Keller is being taken into custody, Guédira searches for Assane, and eventually finds him waiting with his arms outstretched. Assane states that his days as a criminal are over, and instructs Guédira to place him in handcuffs. Guédira leads Assane down the stairs of the Arc de Triomphe to a police car, and asks Assane where the black pearl is. Assane tells him that he doesn’t have it.

The following morning, the officers at the precinct are stunned when Guédira brings Assane in. When they are ensconced in one of the interrogation rooms, Assane offers to tell Guédira his full story, if he fulfils several conditions that Assane has set. He hands Guédira an envelope marked “Claire” and instructs him to give it to Benjamin, whose release he requests. Finally, he asks for his prison cell to be stocked with his full collection of Arsène Lupin books.

Claire arrives at the Gare de l’Est with Raoul and Mariama, remembering when she and Assane had departed the same station in 1998 after the World Cup final. At Assane's instruction, she has bought four tickets. However, the person who meets them is Benjamin, who hands Assane’s envelope to Claire. It contains a letter in which Assane explains that he has willingly gone to jail in order to set Claire and Raoul free. Upon reading Assane’s message, Claire breaks down in Benjamin’s arms. As Benjamin attempts to comfort Claire, he stares apprehensively into the distance.

Assane reads a Lupin story in his prison cell, but is interrupted by a knock at the door. A guard enters his cell, carrying an envelope sent by an inmate in a nearby cell. Assane takes the envelope and opens it to find a photograph of himself as a teenager, holding the Arsène Lupin book Cagliostro’s Revenge. Assane grabs the book from his shelf and begins flipping through it, eventually finding a passage which describes Lupin being betrayed by someone who convinced him that they loved him. Meanwhile, the guard tells Assane’s neighbor that he has delivered the message. The inmate turns around and acknowledges the guard. It is Hubert Pellegrini.

Cast

 * Omar Sy as Assane Diop
 * Ludivine Sagnier as Claire Laurent
 * Antoine Gouy as Benjamin Férel
 * Soufiane Guerrab as Youssef Guédira
 * Mamadou Haïdara as young Assane Diop
 * Etan Simon as Raoul Diop
 * Pierre Lottin as Bruno
 * Steve Tientcheu as Jean-Luc Keller (2021)
 * Salif Cissé as Jean-Luc Keller (1998)
 * Sandra Parfait as Manon (2021)
 * Naky Sy Savané as Mariama Diop (2021)
 * Clotilde Hesme as Juliette Pellegrini
 * Hervé Pierre as Hubert Pellegrini
 * Seyna Kane as Mariama Diop (1998)
 * Ludmilla Makowski as young Claire Laurent


 * Noé Wodecki as young Bruno
 * Johann Dionnet as young Gabriel Dumont
 * Patrick Rocca as Colonel François de Criqui
 * Ali Tiemoko Haïdara as jewelry store security guard
 * Philippe Résimont as Thierry Floron, minister of the interior
 * Thierry Angelvy as ministry guest
 * Salim Kissari as police officer #1
 * Anthony Clervaux as police officer #3
 * Kevin Duforest as police officer #4
 * Aloïs Menu as prison guard
 * François Uzan as boat inspector
 * Ophély Mezino as girl with rose

Music

 * original music by Mathieu Lamboley
 * "Aux Armes et Caetera" by Serge Gainsbourg
 * "Hier Encore" by Charles Aznavour

Trivia

 * Ophély Mezino, who played the young woman given a rose by Assane, is a former beauty pageant winner who was crowned Miss Guadaloupe 2018 and was first runner-up Miss France 2019 and Miss World 2019.