FILMS GLORIFYING the criminal element seem to be quite the rage today. The great success of The Godfather, Prizzi's Honor and now Family Business attest to the popularity of these people we wouldn't want as neighbors. An affair with a woman and plagiarized speeches may be enough to bring down presidential candidates but murder, burglary and treachery only increase our enjoyment of a film.

Family Business

Written and directed by Costa-Gavras

At the USA/Nickelodeon

Unlike many crime films, Family Business has a moral code, for the family never uses weapons in its burglaries. Tranquilizer guns, but not weapons. And when the father finally teams up with "The Organization" towards the end of the film, Costa-Gavras makes this the sign of the family's break-up.

The moral question in the film is annoying and out of place. But it is hardly surprising, coming from a director known for political activism. Z, a controversial film about a political revolution in Greece, vaulted Costa-Gavras to fame in 1969. And Missing, the story of an American who "disappears" in the political turmoil of a Central American dictatorship, re-established the director as a major force in political filmmaking.

But other Costa-Gavras films, including a recent and little-known picture about an American woman who is sucked into spying for Israeli intelligence yet who thinks she is in love with a handsome Palestinian, lack both political insight and quality. Unfortunately, Costa-Gavras is no Cocteau and does not succeed in being a jack of all trades.

WITH FAMILY Business, the director breaks with politics and produces a purely comic film about a family whose main source of income is burglary. Were it the first film of a new director, it might be touted as highly promising. But as the product of a great artiste, it disappoints.

The photography is crystal clear, the characters are impeccably dressed, and the mood is vividly depicted. Where the film runs into problems is in the plot.

As the film opens, Daddy (Johnny Hallyday) is away on business, or as the film chooses to call it, "in the hospital losing his spots." In what is probably the greatest shock of his life, son finds out in school that mama has lied. Daddy, it seems, is really in prison (gasp).

Mommy, played by Fanny Ardant, is not particularly upset with her husband. In fact, she says, Daddy is an artist of burglary. Getting caught is just an occupational hazard.

When Daddy returns from jail, he immediately begins working on projects with his friend Faucon. It is these projects and the family's increasing success which make up the film's plot. And burglary really becomes the family business when the son joins the team of father and Faucon.

FAMILY Business is a film Freudians should see. Between the burglaries, the mother's alcoholism, the father's temper, and the daughter's incestuous desires for her brother, the film is a psychoanalytic feast.

Yet because of these quirks, the film seems more to be drifting from scene to scene than progressing in any interesting fashion. Although some scenes, most notably one in which two Bulgarian men who communicate with the thiefs in Latin nearly foil the heist of some valuable paintings, are hilarious, others seem out of place.

But the actors do the best they can. Ardant, who resembles Meryl Streep and has the wannest face ever filmed, plays her role with the severity and distance it requires, even if the direction does require her to cuddle her children in an overly Freudian way. Halladay, the popular French music star, is a man who has aged well. He is at his best when he is angry, which is most of the time.

Crime, in the end, does not pay. Nevertheless, it is rather too convenient of Costa-Gavras to remind his audience of this fact only after they have sat through an hour and a half of his film.