SPOILER ALERT The marketing for this French film characterized it as a screwball comedy, its humor heightened by its backdrop of WWII. It actually reminded me more of a "Poirot" episode on "Mystery!"-- an elitist's view of the tensions, both interpersonal and political, of the Deco era, with a bit of subtle wit thrown in. It had only a few fleeting moments that could be called comedy, but it was certainly a lighter look at the period than is usually seen ("The Pianist" and "Saving Private Ryan," et al, show a much more disturbing side to the war). The story seemed vaguely familiar (perhaps to the Kate Winslet codebreaking melodrama "Enigma") but, even despite the abbreviated British subtitles, was engaging and diverting for its duration.
The film opens in a darkened movie theatre, where everyone is laughing but a beautiful woman in the front row balcony and a scowling man on the level below, who menacingly glares at her until the lights come up. The woman, it turns out, is the biggest movie star in Paris, Viviane (Isabel Adjani), and her spat with the man will ultimately affect the imminent war in ways neither could have expected. That night, Viviane murders him, and calls upon her childhood friend Frederic (wild-eyed Gregori Derangue) to take the fall for her, which the struggling novelist does. But with the Nazis at Paris's doorstep, he escapes with a fellow ex-con, Raoul (charismatic Yvan Attal), and they travel in search of Isabel, befriending en route a lovely resistance fighter, Camille (Virginie Ledoyen, looking like a Gallic Natalie Portman) and the Jewish physics professor she is protecting, Kopolski (Jean-Marc Stehle). Viviane, meanwhile, has used her wiles to win the protection of the Interior Minister, Beaufort (Gerard Depardieu), but, when he fails to satisfy her demands for preferential treatment, she turns to her journalist friend Winckler (the American actor Peter Coyote, juggling French and German dialogue), whom she does not suspect of being a Nazi spy shadowing Kopolski. When all of the Parisian elite convene in Bordeaux, keeping secrets becomes nearly impossible, and while the script's emotional scenes fail to evoke audience sympathy, Frederic and Raoul's desperate quest to convey Camille, Kopolski, and their precious cargo of "heavy water"-- critical for the atomic bomb's construction-- to safety builds to a genuine climax. The film must have been a big hit in France to it have been brought Stateside, as it without originality in its storytelling and practically G-rated in terms of expected salaciousness, but is still a pleasant, earnestly acted addition to the ever-expanding catalogue of WWII cinema.
The film opens in a darkened movie theatre, where everyone is laughing but a beautiful woman in the front row balcony and a scowling man on the level below, who menacingly glares at her until the lights come up. The woman, it turns out, is the biggest movie star in Paris, Viviane (Isabel Adjani), and her spat with the man will ultimately affect the imminent war in ways neither could have expected. That night, Viviane murders him, and calls upon her childhood friend Frederic (wild-eyed Gregori Derangue) to take the fall for her, which the struggling novelist does. But with the Nazis at Paris's doorstep, he escapes with a fellow ex-con, Raoul (charismatic Yvan Attal), and they travel in search of Isabel, befriending en route a lovely resistance fighter, Camille (Virginie Ledoyen, looking like a Gallic Natalie Portman) and the Jewish physics professor she is protecting, Kopolski (Jean-Marc Stehle). Viviane, meanwhile, has used her wiles to win the protection of the Interior Minister, Beaufort (Gerard Depardieu), but, when he fails to satisfy her demands for preferential treatment, she turns to her journalist friend Winckler (the American actor Peter Coyote, juggling French and German dialogue), whom she does not suspect of being a Nazi spy shadowing Kopolski. When all of the Parisian elite convene in Bordeaux, keeping secrets becomes nearly impossible, and while the script's emotional scenes fail to evoke audience sympathy, Frederic and Raoul's desperate quest to convey Camille, Kopolski, and their precious cargo of "heavy water"-- critical for the atomic bomb's construction-- to safety builds to a genuine climax. The film must have been a big hit in France to it have been brought Stateside, as it without originality in its storytelling and practically G-rated in terms of expected salaciousness, but is still a pleasant, earnestly acted addition to the ever-expanding catalogue of WWII cinema.