In San Francisco, two men kill a Chinese woman after robbing her store. One of the thieves has the same characteristics of the Italian immigrant Eddie Pedak (Alain Delon) and he becomes the prime suspect of Inspector Mike Vido (Van Heflin). Eddie is an ex-thief that was found not guilty for shooting Vito in a bank heist, but the inspector blames him. Presently Eddie is married with a child with Kristine Pedak (Ann- Margret), works as a truck driver and has put a down payment on a fishing vessel with his savings. Out of the blue, Eddie's brother and gangster Walter Pedak (Jack Palance) and his henchmen Arthur Sargatanas (Davis Chandler) and Cleveland 'Cleve' Shoenstein (Tony Musante) visit Eddie to invite him to participate in a one-million dollar heist. Eddie loses his job and his personal life is deeply affected by Vito since he can not find another job. He decides to meet his brother and accepts to participate in the hold up. Meanwhile Vito discovers that Eddie was actually framed in the Chinese murder. He visits Eddie to disclose his findings to him but Eddie has already participated in the plan. What will happen to him?"Once a Thief" is an engaging film with a non-original story and unfair conclusion. The direction and performances are top-notch but the situations are inspired in many film-noirs. The deceptive hopeless conclusion will certainly disappoint many viewers. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "A Marca de um Erro" ("The Mark of a Mistake")

Gosh he was so handsome. I wish I liked his movies better. "Once a Thief" from 1965 was another disappointment, despite a good cast. It's a crime flick starring Delon, Ann-Margret, Jack Palance, Van Heflin, and John Davis Chandler.Heflin is a cop dying to get something on former criminal Delon, who intends to go straight. But Heflin's harassment loses him his job, and he can't get another to support his wife (Ann-Margret) and daughter. So he agrees to go in with his brother (Palance) and his brother's scary friend (Chandler) and commit a crime that will give him a big payday.Depressing with an uneven script, though the performances were good. Hard to picture Delon and Palance as brothers, though. Maybe they had different mothers.Ann-Margret did not have much to do except look sexy serving cocktails, cry, and scream. Delon was a huge star everywhere but in the U.S. He was effective in many films. But he never had an American affect or was the right kind of leading man for U.S. audiences, any more than Jean Gabin was.Had he appeared in a widely distributed film directed with a foreign sensibility he might have done better. Directors like Anton Corbijn, M. Night Shyalaman, Wes Anderson would have been better for him. Alas that ship sailed as he is now retired and overseeing the production of all the products that bear his name.A downer. Not great, not awful.

Any semi-serious movie buff or even casual viewer should be able to see that this film practically screams "Coen Brothers," 30 years before their time. The creepy blond character in "Fargo" is a dead ringer for the creepy blond bad guy in "Once a Thief," right down to the hairstyle. And the general ambiance of many scenes, as well as the ironic plot twists near the end, indicate that this movie was a big influence on the Coen bros, and to some extent, "where they went to school." It should also be noted that though this is film noir, it's also "hip" film noir, a rare breed that includes Larry Moyer's "The Moving Finger" and precious few others of the time. In fact, both these movies were too hip for their time.

**SOME SPOILERS** Late, for 1965 that is, 1940's like film noir crime drama that has an ex-convict who spent 18 months in San Quentin for armed robbery trying to go straight. With his gangster brother having other ideas for him that could very well send him either to the San Quintin death chamber or the San Francisco City morgue.Eddie Pedak, Alan Delon, has been saving money from his job at a meat processing plant on the docks to buy himself a fishing boat and be independent for the first time in his life. Having both a beautiful wife Kristine, Ann-Margaret, and cute six-year-old daughter Kathy, Tammy Locke, things have never looked better for Eddie since he was released from prison back in 1956 when he was 21. Thats until his older brother Walter, Jack Palance, came back into Eddie's life. It's very obvious right from the start that Eddie had been set up by Walter and his gang in a robbery/murder in San Francisco's Chinatown. Were totally kept in the dark to who committed the crime and then almost within minutes of the murder Eddie shows up driving the very same car, a Ford Model-T, and wearing the same sheepskin jacket that the faceless killer wore.SFPD police inspector Vito, Van Heflin, on the scene of the killing immediately suspects that Eddie Pedak was the murderer since he fit the murderer profile and description. It also comes out that Eddie shot Vito some time ago during a robbery, where he was eventually found innocent by a jury, that lodged a .38 slug in his gut This severally effected his digestive system, making it virtually impossible for Vito to eat his favorite Italian and Mexican food. Inspt. Vito Picking up Eddie for questioning at his place of employment causes Eddie to eventually loses his job. This forced Eddie to have his gorgeous and well-stacked wife Kristine, the 36-23-36 Ann-Margaret, work at the Big Al Night-Club as a scantily clad cocktail waitress. It's there where Kristine ends up making more money in one night then Eddie made all week by him hauling and stacking hunks of meat at the dockside factory.Feeling less then a man doing housework where at the same time Kristine was bringing home the beacon Eddie goes to Big Al's just to see what his wife was doing and that did it for him. Seeing customers groping and ogling at the beautiful Kristine and stuffing bills, some as much as $20.00, into her waitress outfit had Eddie throw a fit and drag the very shocked and embarrassed Kristine out of the place. Eddie is now determined more then ever to work for his brother Walter. Eddie together with his two fellow thugs Sargatanas & Shoswstein, John David Chandler & Ton Musante, planned the knocking off of his former employer of a cool one million dollars worth of platinum locked up in the company safe.The well planned robbery turns out to be a smashing success but the greed among the robbers, in double-crossing each other, in the end does them all in. With the crazed Sargatanas blasting away funeral director co-conspirator and explosive expert John Ling, Yuki Shimoda, as soon as they were about to make their getaway.Walter doing some double-crossing of his own takes off, together with his kid-brother Eddie, with the valuable platinum bars hiding them in a tractor-trailer together with the getaway car. Finding Walter at the prearranged hideout that he's to meet Eddie Sargatanas blows him away, off screen. To make sure that Eddie and his wife and little girl don't check out of town, with the platinum bars,Sargatanas kidnap's little Kathy holding her hostage until Eddie comes clean by telling him and his fellow hood Shoewstein, after having his front teeth kicked out by Eddie earlier in the movie, where the loot is hidden.Knowing that the crazed and double-crossing Sargatanas can't be trusted in returning Kathy back safe and sound Eddie reluctantly goes to Inspt. Vito's house and makes a deal with him to captured both Sargatanas and Shoewstein at the docks. It's there where the final totally unexpected and explosive scene in the film "Once a Thief" takes place.