Vu sur France 5, Place au cinéma.
Realistic approaches can be worth a try with many subjects. Pialat's style, some kind of hyper-realism, was interesting within his tales of youth for example. But when you take a crime intrigue and film it this way, it trades any entertainment value this kind of thing has natively for... for what? A mundane depiction of the "real" work of policemen & co. is flavourless, especially because it is still weaker than a documentary would be.
The director is so much more interested in documenting us the workings of a police station and later his characters states that the film seems to remember its criminal plot only at the very end.
We still get good performances from a Depardieu that never failed to be good before hitting his 40s, Sophie Marceau (partially) and Pialat's favourite, Sandrine Bonnaire, in a very small role that is nevertheless the strongest display of acting in Police. Sadly, the rest of the cast stays far behind, often looking like they're in an entirely different movie (notably Anconina).
Score: 6/10
Enjoyment: 2/5