I don't watch silent films quite as often as I should, but this one reminds me I should try harder once more. Most praises I've read about (this one), go out to the third and final act, which is absolutely understandable, but I was very impressed with the hour and fifty minutes before that also. How the relationship between Jean and François changes was most impressively done, both by story and by acting (especially Séverin-Mars, who plays the latter, while Romuald Joubé deserves special credit for his part in act three, when he loses his mind).
This war- and love-story works on many levels. It deals with the horrors of war, but also how man (and woman and child) can overcome - though obviously not without scars. The part of the child that was conceived through rape is especially harrowing, but the love of Jean and Edith helps even the raging soldier François to gain understanding of true love - though the scene in which the child must play a German soldier with the French kids is again hard to watch.
The words 'J'accuse' return many times in the film, but who is really accused in the first part of the film? The war ministers in their safe retreats, one would say? When we witness one them being struck personally by a (war) tragedy, we must conclude no. The words 'I accuse' are more likely the perfectly logical way of expressing one's desire to blame someone - anyone - for all miseries that may come about in life; in war, ánd in love. When finally Jean looks out his window and blames the sun, this seems to substantiate that idea; it is an angry, desperate rant against a 'thing' which will burn no less when it is addressed. Of course I do not mean to dismiss here the part just before that, in which the returning dead army ghosts accuse their close ones of betrayal in various ways, but their accusations are instantly cathartic to all, and both the survivors and the dead may carry on. So, I'd like to doubt the reviews I've read about this film being anti-war, Abel Gance 'simply' seems to say that horrors of these kind had better be worth the while...? Just my two cents after this first viewing.
Then there is an owl (symbol of the night) who acts as the prophet of war, someone resembling 'Astérix le Gaulois' as a symbol of bravery on the side of the French soldiers, beautiful visualizations of a book of poems called 'Les pacifiques', and so on. I can't say I fully understood all of it, but I did enjoy pretty much all of it; who is then really bothered when someone looks into the camera now and then (accidentally, I presume) or when there seem to be some wrongly cut short bits here and there (again, accidentally, I presume)? And, perhaps strangely, but it worked somehow, there is room for some humour
Impressive, to say the least. A big 8 out of 10.
This war- and love-story works on many levels. It deals with the horrors of war, but also how man (and woman and child) can overcome - though obviously not without scars. The part of the child that was conceived through rape is especially harrowing, but the love of Jean and Edith helps even the raging soldier François to gain understanding of true love - though the scene in which the child must play a German soldier with the French kids is again hard to watch.
The words 'J'accuse' return many times in the film, but who is really accused in the first part of the film? The war ministers in their safe retreats, one would say? When we witness one them being struck personally by a (war) tragedy, we must conclude no. The words 'I accuse' are more likely the perfectly logical way of expressing one's desire to blame someone - anyone - for all miseries that may come about in life; in war, ánd in love. When finally Jean looks out his window and blames the sun, this seems to substantiate that idea; it is an angry, desperate rant against a 'thing' which will burn no less when it is addressed. Of course I do not mean to dismiss here the part just before that, in which the returning dead army ghosts accuse their close ones of betrayal in various ways, but their accusations are instantly cathartic to all, and both the survivors and the dead may carry on. So, I'd like to doubt the reviews I've read about this film being anti-war, Abel Gance 'simply' seems to say that horrors of these kind had better be worth the while...? Just my two cents after this first viewing.
Then there is an owl (symbol of the night) who acts as the prophet of war, someone resembling 'Astérix le Gaulois' as a symbol of bravery on the side of the French soldiers, beautiful visualizations of a book of poems called 'Les pacifiques', and so on. I can't say I fully understood all of it, but I did enjoy pretty much all of it; who is then really bothered when someone looks into the camera now and then (accidentally, I presume) or when there seem to be some wrongly cut short bits here and there (again, accidentally, I presume)? And, perhaps strangely, but it worked somehow, there is room for some humour
Impressive, to say the least. A big 8 out of 10.