Lucie Aubrac (1997) - film review

Lyon, 1943.  In Nazi occupied France, Raymond Aubrac is a leading member of the French Resistance.  Shortly after blowing up a German supply train, he is arrested, ostensibly for blackmarketeering.  His wife Lucie, an independently minded schoolteacher, takes it upon herself to get him released.  Not long after this, Raymond is arrested a second time, whilst attending a meeting of Resistance leaders.  After being brutally beaten and questioned by the Gestapo chief Klaus Barbie, Raymond is thrown into prison to await his impending execution.  Lucie is prepared to do anything to save her husband’s life and so enlists the support of his Resistance allies to rescue him.  First, she must persuade the implacable Barbie to allow her to marry the condemned man...

Claude Berri’s sombre adaptation of Lucie Aubrac’s wartime memoirs Ils partiront dans l’ivresse offers both a harrowingly realistic portrayal of life in the French Resistance and a moving tale of the triumph of love over Nazi brutality.  There have been many films about the Resistance but few that present such a recognisably feminine point of view.  It is the central character’s humanity and dogged determination to save her husband’s life that sets the film apart from others of its ilk, bringing into stark relief the single-minded savagery of the Resistance’s Nazi opponents.  The film was noted at the time of its release for its uncompromising depiction of physical violence - in particular the barely watchable sequence in which the heroine’s husband (superbly played by Daniel Auteuil) is repeatedly beaten by Klaus Barbie, a psychotic thug if ever there was one.

This was the third notable film set during the Second World War which Claude Berri directed, after his remarkable debut feature Le Vieil homme et l’enfant (1967) and the acclaimed Uranus (1990), which was controversial for its unflattering depiction of the French under Nazi Occupation.  Whilst Lucie Aubrac is a far grander film than these two comparatively modest productions (it had the budget of a comparable Hollywood blockbuster, and shows), it doesn’t quite match their charm and immediacy.  Secondary characters are thinly developed, often little more than caricatures, and, in its striving for authenticity, the film occasionally slips in the odd cliché.  What redeems the film are the stunning central performances from Carole Bouquet and Daniel Auteuil, who give the film the compassionate edge it badly needs to offset the cold detachment of Berri’s mise-en-scène and the brutality of the film’s darker sequences.

Bouquet has come a long way since she first came to prominence as the gutsy Bond girl in For Your Eyes Only (1981).  In one of her career highpoints, she captivates with her true-to-life portrayal of devotion and defiance.  Her Lucie Aubrac is a woman of rare courage and resilience, and, through Bouquet’s nuanced performance, it is easy to see where these qualities derive from.  In contrast to her Nazi enemies, whose toughness comes solely from macho posturing and a lack of humanity, Aubrac’s fearsome resolve flows from her undying love for the man to whom she has pledged her everlasting devotion.  As ever, Auteuil ends up having to play the hopeless victim, physically and emotionally broken by his experiences, his courage smashed like an eggshell to expose the gooey mess within.   By contrast, Bouquet’s Aubrac is as unflinching and unassailable as an entire Panzer division; emboldened by love, driven by the protective instincts of a wife and mother, she takes on Barbie and his jackbooted cohorts as though they were just a gang of naughty schoolboys and leaves us in no doubt that she belongs to the stronger and nobler sex.  Resistance is not just a matter of blowing up trains; it is also about staying true to your beliefs and not allowing the tyrant to break your will - something which this compelling film drama demonstrates admirably.

© James Travers 2011

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