Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie

Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		5.0
Extras		2.0
Overall		4.0

Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Dr. Svet Atanasov April 1, 2025

Gilles Grangier's "Hi-Jack Highway" (1955) arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber. The supplemental features on the release include new audio commentary by critic and author Simon Abrams and restored vintage trailer. In French, with optional English subtiltes for the main feature.

If you want to play, I will give you a game.

Gilles Grangier and Jean Gabin were very close friends and made several wonderful films together. Technically, all are crime films, but they are quite different. Some of these films are hilarious crime comedies about perfect jobs executed by unprofessional professional criminals and unlucky amateurs getting involved in more than they can handle. The rest are legitimate crime films that tend to imitate the classic American film noirs. In all of these films, Gabin played good and bad characters, plus a couple of characters who were stuck in the gray zone, where right and wrong constantly overlap.

Hi-Jack Highway (also known as Gas-Oil) has one of these characters who is stuck in the gray zone. Gabin is Jean Chape, an aging provincial truck driver who has been working hard to ensure that in a few years he will be fully independent and, after a few more years, ready to retire. To get to where he wants to be, Chape must be constantly on the move, transporting loads from his hometown to Paris and other major cities across the country and promptly making the payments on his new truck. This is the crucial element in Chape’s plan -- paying off the bank loan for the new truck.

However, despite being careful and staying out of trouble, Chape finds himself in an awful predicament. After spending the night with his mistress (Jeanne Moreau) in another town, he runs over a body lying in the middle of the road. When Chape reports the incident, an unfriendly investigator impounds his truck and, to close the case as quickly as possible, even attempts to force him to confess that while running over the body, he was still feeling the effects of the alcohol he had consumed with his mistress. Barely able to contain his anger, Chape then becomes a target for several armed out-of-towners and the dead man’s widow (Ginette Leclerc), who, at the right time, reveals to him that when her husband disappeared, he was carrying a leather bag with fifty million francs.

Of all the crime films Grangier and Gabin made together, Hi-Jack Highway is the only one that intentionally expands the material around the crime, rather than gradually narrowing it and preparing for the inevitable dissection of the crime before the finale. This allows Hi-Jack Highway to do something very similar to what the British ‘kitchen sink’ dramas became famous for -- tap into a particular working-class environment and present it to the audience as unfiltered as possible.

In Hi-Jack Highway, the chosen environment is in rural France, where Chape and other characters like him struggle to make ends meet. They are tough guys, but with limited options, so they roll the dice as often as needed and get in trouble. When the armed out-of-towners appear, this is the dynamic they expose.

Unlike the British ‘kitchen sink’ dramas, Hi-Jack Highway does not use crime and drama to promote miserabilism, in any form. It just observes Chape and his fellow truck drivers until they figure out the most efficient way to deal with the armed out-of-towners and restore (im)perfect order in the area they call home.

While working with cinematographer Pierre Montazel, Grangier was assisted by Jacques Deray, who directed such iconic crime films as Symphony for a Massacre, Flic Story, and Borsalino.

Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Presented in its original aspect ratio of 1.37:1, encoded with MPEG-4 AVC and granted a 1080p transfer, Hi-Jack Highway arrives on Blu-ray courtesy of Kino Lorber.

The release introduces a 4K restoration of Hi-Jack Highway, completed at L'Immagine Ritrovata in 2021. This 4K restoration was made available on Blu-ray in France a few years ago, and I saw and liked it a lot, so I hoped that eventually it will reach America.

There is only one area that could have been managed better, which should not come as a surprise to those who have seen various 4K restorations of black-and-white films completed at L'Immagine Ritrovata. In darker areas, sometimes shadows and shadow nuances do not look as great as they should, creating the impression that gamma levels are slightly off. Fortunately, while there are a few such areas on this 4K restoration, the fluctuations are very small. The rest is excellent or outstanding. For example, delineation and clarity are terrific, especially during the daylight outdoor footage. Depth is very good, too, though you will notice the few fluctuations I mentioned above. There are no traces of degraining, sharpening, contrast boosting, etc. Needless to say, grain and grain exposure are quite impressive. The entire film looks immaculate, too. (Note: This is a Region-A "locked" Blu-ray release. Therefore, you must have a Region-A or Region-Free player in order to access its content).

Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

There is only one standard audio track on this Blu-ray release: French DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. Optional English subtitles are provided for the main feature.

The lossless track is great. It is immediately obvious that it was fully remastered/restored because it is nicely rounded and very stable. Yes, there are a few areas with small fluctuations, like the chase in the mountain at the end of the film, but these are inherited limitations. Dynamic contrasts are very modest, but this is also something that the lossless track replicates. The English translation is excellent.

Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Commentary - this exclusive new audio commentary was recorded by critic and author Simon Abrams. The commentary covers a lot of ground. Mr. Abrams addresses Gilles Grangier and Jean Gabin's professional relationship, the production of Hi-Jack Highway, Gabin's character and environment, the film's tone and visual style, etc. Mr. Abrams rightfully points out that many, including some of Grangier's best films, are still very difficult or impossible to see in America.

• Trailer - presented here is a fully restored trailer for Hi-Jack Highway. In French, with English subtitles. (4 min).

Hi-Jack Highway Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Gilles Grangier and Jean Gabin made quite a few crime films together, and Hi-Jack Highway is the most unconventional one because it is conceived like an early British 'kitchen sink' drama. However, unlike its famous relatives, it visits a unique working-class environment and, more importantly, it refuses to use crime and drama to promote miserabilism, in any form. For a taste of Grangier and Gabin's more conventional work, most of which is very impressive, see The Night Affair, a gorgeous thriller paying tribute to the classic American film noirs. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.