Director Olivier Marchal is a former Parisian policeman & the story of 36 Quai des Orfevres draws on his own experiences of the police force as well as those of Dominique Loiseau who was a senior member of the BRI (Search & action Squad) in the mid-eighties & worked as a consultant on the film Leo Vrinks (Auteuil) & Denis Klein (Depardieu) are at the head of two different departments of the Paris police force located at Quai des Orfevres Once close they are no longer friends mainly due to their differing work methods & Vrinks& wife Camille An audacious gang of robbers stage seven armed robberies throughout Paris leaving a bloody trail in their wake After a year of terror the Chief of Police orders that Vrinks & Klein bring the criminals to justice with a substantial boon to the man who brings them in His job As the competition between the two men hots up the lines between right & wrong become blurred Both men find themselves sinking into a hellish place not far removed from that of the criminals