Anne-marie Medcalf* likes it and gives it 4 Stars out of 5 – so it must be good!
A little like its own subject, the story of the release of Antonin Baudry’s De Gaulle : Resistance, the first of two three-hour films on the role of De Gaulle during the World War II is one that goes from disheartening setback to exhilarating success.
When the film, one of the most expensive to be made in France to date with its cost of about €100 millions, was released in June of this year it first looked like it would be a box office disaster despite excellent reviews. People were not biting. Three weeks later though, thanks to a large extent to the multiple heat waves that struck Europe all summer, sending the French population to air-conditioned cinemas, a three hour film started to sound divine. Word of mouth from enthusiastic cinema goers did the rest from then on and the producers have now just celebrated their more than 5 million French attendees with a Thank You ad.
De Gaulle : Resistance covers the period from June 1940 to the very beginning of 1943. It starts when Charles de Gaulle, magnificently played by Simon Abkarian, arrived in London, refusing to acknowledge the new Vichy regime led by Marechal Pétain in the south of France, in collaboration with the Germans who had annexed the north. The film therefore covers only a short part of World War II but a crucial one both in terms of the development of the French resistance and its participation in allied military operations, and in terms of De Gaulle’s political career, thinking and actions.
In that sense it is not a typical biopic. It is a homage to de Gaulle, albeit one tongue in cheek on occasion, and an ode to the French resistance, warts and all. It is a political and historical drama with a penchant for satire, as well as a thumping war and action movie. It is also emotional and nostalgic moments, including at the very beginning when we see de Gaulle delivering his now legendary appeal to resistance on the BBC on the 18 June 1940, one day after his arrival in England. From then on the hours fly.
Antonin Baudry, whose first career was in government policy and diplomacy, is also a renown graphic novelist, under the name of Abel Lanzac. FSN readers might remember The French Minister (Quai d’Orsay), which was drawn from his eponymous graphic novel. Baudry joyously brings this background to the structure and tone of De Gaulle, especially through the sometimes caricatural vignettes staging Churchill and de Gaulle’s negotiations – colourful negotiations tinted with some level of respect, irritation and affection. Other examples are the vignettes representing de Gaulle at the start of the film, as he was probably portrayed by the section of the British cabinet as to negotiations with Germany – as an inconvenient and preposterous madman. There are also softer scenes showing us in a blink of an eye, and quite delicately, de Gaulle’s family life through his wife Yvonne’s hallmark support and his affection for one of his daughters affected by Down syndrome and who he always refused to place in an institution as was done at the time.
Baudry focuses mainly on the military resistance led by de Gaulle from London with the reluctant backing of the British and American governments. In that sense, the battle of Bir Hakeim led by the French general Koenig (played by a Benoit Magimel in his element) is at the heart of the movie, both for its importance in allowing the British troops to regroup before the battle of Alamein and for the military feat it represented. Cinematically it is magnificent and the suspense keeps us on the edge of our seats. Viewed from Australia, this episode, as well as another one earlier in the film, evokes shades of Gallipoli in the heroism and resilience shown by the combatants, but also in the ruthlessness of the British and, it must be said, of de Gaulle in their readiness to sacrifice non British troops for the ultimate goal.
The place given to the internal resistance, the one initiatedfrom France in its multiple forms is perhaps the weak point of the film. It is is shown somewhat symbolically on the one hand through the character of Fernand Bonnier de La Chappelle, a seemingly lone wolf who changed the course of history in North Africa, with a final action. It is played forcefully by Florian Lesieur. It is also shown through Jean Moulin, hero of the French internal resistance and allied to de Gaulle, for whom he worked to unify the resistance. He appears in two scenes and you would be forgiven if you missed him, so passing and rapid are those scenes.
De Gaulle : Resistance in a few words is a film that excellently depicts the madness, the arrogance, the certainties and the genius of de Gaulle, as well as the way he, from the very beginning, established the basis of French Foreign policy up to the present day. It was a policy based on his idea of ‘grandeur de la France’ and on its non alignment in relation to the Great Powers, be they the US or the Soviet Union.
I give it 4 out of 5 stars.
Screening at Luna Leederville + Luna on SX, from 3 September.
*By Anne-Marie Medcalf, our Parisian/Fremantle film buff. If you’d like to know more about Anne-Marie’s love of movies look here.
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