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88 out of 124 people found the following comment useful :-
Recommended-now if only Bush, Blair et. al. could only see this they might learn something about patriotism, 28 March 2006

Author: max von meyerling from New York

Today, watching a film like Mr.and Mrs. North (2005) or one of the Bourne or Mission Impossibles or any of the current crop of 'action' films up to and including the latest Kung Fu spectacular with invulnerable flying fighting machines, seems to have rendered the genre into a profitable degeneracy rendering the depiction of actual human beings or their cinematic similitude obsolete as cave paintings. That anyone could be entertained by the goings on of a Charlie's Angles movie puzzles me. I do know there is no audience for a genuine film detailing the lives and works of a genuine underground resistance like that of the French during the German Nazi occupation.

This might be the most mundane, matter-of-fact war movie since Robert Montgomery's overlooked masterpiece The Gallant Hours. This is because the people, patriots all, who rose to fight, were pretty ordinary people from rather prosaic walks of life. When it come to resisting a foreign tyranny in the form of an occupying army it isn't a bunch of professionally trained assassins who can be counted on but politically aware citizens who organize. These are ordinary people who had to rise to a situation. It is pure Existentialism.

This is a very spare, almost Jansenist version of the true story of the French Resistance. This Melville is, as usual, the opposite side of the coin from his twin, Robert Bresson. At one point the central character played by Lino Ventura, escapes by simply running away. He is helped along the way by a man who doesn't even mention the situation or his role in assisting. Its just done because that is what one does. The German's are hardly seen as this film is simply not about them. Each death, there are very, very few of them, is a moral and ethical agony. At least for the resistance. The torture scenes are all off camera.

Directoral moments are minimal, such as when Ventura buys a new suit and shoes and then must leave them behind. Its like what soldiers say about combat, extreme longueurs of boredom interrupted by moments of sheer terror.

The truth behind the story is that the German Gestapo commander, Klaus Barbie, the so called Butcher of Lyon, was a war criminal who was spirited out of Europe after the war by the US to train military regimes in South America in the techniques of torture that he perfected in France.

In one of the set pieces British STOL Lysander aircraft land to and take off to bring certain resistance members to London. This scene features the actual aircraft. This was particularly amazing as most Melville films suffer from budgetary constrictions which usually effect the realism of certain scenes (see the helicopter/train transfer in Un Flic) and there were possibly only two airworthy Lysanders at the time of the filming of L' Armée des ombres. The parachuting scene is also so nicely judged in its almost prosaic ordinariness, yet we know its still a jump into the seemingly limitless darkness, but which would aggravate the ADD generation. The dry, almost Islandic renderings of scenes, sometimes to the level of an Industrial film, reminds me of the flat rendering Truffaut did of simply fueling a car at a service station in Le Peau Douce. This is why Melville and Bresson were the honorary mentors of the New Wave. It was a further adaptation of Realism and neo-realism but with an awareness that at all times it was a film and therefore an adaption of reality but distorted only to make the truth more vivid.

It is a pity if, as I think, this film will fail to connect with a generation saturated on the super hero shenanigans of SFX dare-a-doings. One writer pointed out the ridiculousness of someone deliberately sending himself to prison in order to deliver a cyanide capsule, totally discounting true sacrifice for the type of action where the pretty actors manage to survive almost any cataclysm so that in the end, after the death of countless nameless and faceless minions and the elimination of the satanic villain-in-chief, while ankle deep in gore, they can have a nice chuckle. Hey babes, that's entertainment.

Looking at the restored version of L' Armée des ombres just emphasizes the death of film culture, not because there are no writers and directors who can make films like this but because there are no audiences for films like this. Highly recommended.

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46 out of 52 people found the following comment useful :-
A masterpiece by the book, 12 July 2004

Author: auberus from Paris

Never before (and after) a movie on French Resistance has been so "glamourless". Jean-Pierre Melville has been hailed as the father of the French gangster film. Certainly, his gangster films are probably the films for which he is best known (Le Doulos, Deuxieme Soufflé, Le Samourai, Le cercle rouge, Bob le flambeur) on par if not better than anything which Hollywood produced. Yet the world of the anonymous gun-toting hoodlum occupies only a part of his oeuvre.

'L'armee des ombres' (aka The Shadow Army) is Jean Pierre Melville 1969 masterpiece and does not deal with gangsters. The film is a mix of the director's war time experiences in the French Resistance and Joseph Kessel successful wartime novel. What is remarkable about this film is that Melville turned a mosaic of anecdotes that Kessel's novel is all about into a great, dark epic.

From the chilling opening shot of Germans marching down the Champs-Elysées to the final scene involving the fellow Resistant Mathilde (the great Simone Signoret) the film seems to demonstrate that fighting for an ideal often leads towards death and solitude. What Melville does successfully is to show those dead-ends the way they occur to their protagonist (very simply and minimalist), however more than showing them Mr. Melville managed to make these realities (death and solitude) an equally tragic experienced for the audience...

'L'armee des ombres' is Melville's most moving film, a monument to the spirit of the Resistance rather than its actuality. A poignant drama with a strong performance from not only Lino Ventura but also Simone Signoret, Paul Meurisse, Jean Pierre Cassel, Claude Mann, Paul Crauchet to name a few.

This is probably Melville's greatest cinematographic achievement and, when fiction becomes reality, when actors leave behind their egos to resurrect into heroes, when the colors of the film mirror the one of the soul and when silence becomes music, true cinema has been achieved… 'L'armee des ombres' is a terrible yet powerful experience in which the words duty, courage, abnegation get charged with meaning…

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39 out of 46 people found the following comment useful :-
far from fake romanticism, 7 November 1998
Author: Cath-10 from France

This is probably one of the best fiction movies ever made on the French resistance during Worl War II. Far from the usual romantic cliches showing handsome young men playing tricks with the Nazis and falling in love with sublime women, the substance of the movie is reality. It depicts a "shadow army" made of courageous men who are ready to sacrifice their lives but are aware of the huge cost they will eventually have to pay. It shows the cruel and sometimes inhuman choices they have to make in order to survive. This is a very useful movie that gives a real hint of what resistance truly was.

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26 out of 31 people found the following comment useful :-
Not just Melville's masterpiece but one of the greatest films ever made, 20 December 2004

Author: burrobaggy from Newcastle, home of footie

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

It took me a long time to track this on down (thanks to another IMDb poster), and I'd heard so many posters on the European Film board raving about it for years, so I was a bit worried it'd turn out to be a disappointment. Seeing it in unsubtitled french didn't help, with my French not exactly great. but, lucky enough, the film isn't too dialogue-heavy and even more lucky, it really is a masterpiece. How good? I'd actually put it down as the best film I've seen this year.

Part gangster movie, part documentary in its style, it's a great look at the doomed lives of a group of resistance workers in occupied France. No big movie heroics, no big explosions, just lots of tension and having to deal with the awful details, like killing an informer in the most practical way possible, each new job taking a little bit more of their humanity away, often losing their lives and making no difference. And the end caption revealing the fate of the characters really hit me hard.

Excellent performances too, especial kudos to Lino Ventura's weary and watchful lead and Jean-Pierre Cassel, but the whole cast are superb. And so many great scenes, like the improvised escape via a barbershop or the moment when Ventura gives away his last cigarettes to other prisoners because he knows they'll all be shot in a few minutes time. I can't speak highly enough of this one and really hope that Criterion will do this sooner rather than later - but why didn't the BFI release it with their batch of Melville DVDs earlier this year? So good I'm going to watch it again this week.

I definitely think a petition to Criterion is in order here!

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34 out of 47 people found the following comment useful :-
Seldom Seen Human's in War and Resistance., 4 March 2005

Author: (ikwil@eindelijkeenwebsite.nl) from Netherlands

I saw this brilliant drama-piece a long time ago and it bound me to my chair. I couldn't move. It is so dramatic and meaningful, and full of betrayal. A choice of life and death never before so condemning in film registered as Jean Pierre Melville himself. He was here recounting his memory as a underground member.

Never before I saw a movie where betrayal had such an impact. I wanted to scream and to help them, but Melville does a little about that.

Spend a lot of nights with bad dreams and a complete loss of human insight.

This masterwork deserves the maximum score. 10*

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23 out of 26 people found the following comment useful :-
Brilliantly gripping, poignant tribute to the Resistance movement in occupied France, 20 March 2006

Author: jono-73 from United Kingdom

*** This comment may contain spoilers ***

Re-released in UK cinemas this week in a superbly restored new print, I doubt if I'll see many better movies in 2006 than Jean-Pierre Melville's overlooked classic of 1969, "L'Armée des ombres". This gripping drama of the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France was given shot shrift by French critics on its original release. A measured, restrained piece of film-making, it must have seemed decidedly out of step with the times - there's not a trace of New Wave styling to be found and furthermore, in its nostalgic, yet notably unsentimental, recollection of the heroes of the Resistance it unavoidably nods to de Gaulle, the death knell of whose era the student riots of the previous year had already sounded. But trends come and go, whilst classical excellence endures, and to modern eyes "L'Armée des ombres" is as far from knee-jerk nationalism as a war movie can get. Dripping with a sense of melancholy and futility, Melville's film focuses on a small cell of individuals pugnaciously striving to undermine the German occupation against seemingly insurmountable odds. Led by the 'aloof and ironic' Philippe Gerbier, played with tremendous authority and grace by the great Lino Ventura, the group is a deeply inter-dependent yet fragile unit. Human intimacy is shown to be almost impossible. A miscalculation or a word out of turn could bring not merely Gerbier's cell, but the entire Resistance movement crashing down. Therefore, each member of the cell is thrown back on him or herself, existentially isolated and vulnerable. The deep melancholy of Melville's film stems from a sense that the only dialogue the characters can afford is terse and cryptic, that each of them in the end must function alone, scarcely engaging with each other and almost entirely cut off from family and friends. One particular scene illustrates this most vividly. Jean-Francois (Jean-Pierre Cassel), a member of Gerbier's cell, pays a poignant visit to his older brother Luc (Paul Meurisse). They engage in small talk, reminiscence, the younger brother unaware that dear 'dreamy' Luc, as we later learn, is in fact Gerbier's chief. A second story strand involving the fearless Mathilde (Simone Signoret), sheds light on the torment of conflicting loyalties and emotional ties with even greater force.

The film, based on Joseph Kessel's 1943 book, covers a span of mere months in the winter of 1942/3, enough time in which to illustrate the seemingly futile cycle of capture, escape, action and capture again that defined the life of a successful Resistance fighter. Extremely well acted, and superbly photographed in washed-out greys and dark greens and blues by Pierre Lhomme (who has also been involved in the restoration process), "L'Armée des ombres" is perhaps a little slow to get going, but be patient and you'll be rewarded by a film that builds inexorably in power towards its ineffably sad conclusion.

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23 out of 29 people found the following comment useful :-
A Classic in World Cinema, 27 April 2006

Author: GRMacE from Los Angeles

If you have any interest whatsoever in French cinema, World War II, moral ambiguity, or Simone Signoret, see this film.

Filmed in a cold, documentary-like style, the "Shadow Army" tells the intertwining stories of several members of the French resistance. The movie defies any sort of simple categorization. It is a thriller without being thrilling. It is a spy story without a single gadget. It portrays the tedium of the task without being boring. Finally, it tells a story of heroic courage without the benefit of a single hero. That last point isn't immediately evident and you are free to disagree, of course, but heroes (as defined in the usual movie terms) are hard to come by in this story.

A popular adage goes; one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter. This movie serves up proof to that lie. There are true freedom fighters that will never be labeled "terrorist" and you will meet them during the course of this film. The movie makes clear that they, and the ones around them, paid a high price in pursuit of freedom. Not just in life and limb, but in moral conviction. As the movie unfolds, I found myself asking, is this action justified? The answer, of course, is that it most certainly is. The better question is would I, or anyone I know, have the courage to do what had to be done.

The technical aspects of the film are all first rate even though a bit below the best of European cinema at the time. (In some ways, the lack of high definition color and sets give it a feel much more in keeping with the time it portrays.) The actors disappear into their roles and there is not a star-turn to be found.

According to the announcement made before the screening I attended, it is being released in the United States on May 12, 2006, just before the summer blockbuster crush. Why that date and why now, almost 30 years after it was made, I do not know. My guess is it probably has something to do with money. (Doesn't it always?) Whatever the reasons, skip the Tom Cruise vehicle and don't miss the opportunity to see it.

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9 out of 9 people found the following comment useful :-
Heroism in its ugly glory, as history tells it, 12 February 2008

Author: rory-campbell from Lisbon, Portugal

Based on truth, the Army in the Shadows takes the French men and women of the Resistance as its theme, at a point near the end of the war when the Resistance movement and Nazi intelligence about its work and staff are both firmly established. As well as giving a thrilling history lesson in the workings of the Resistance, from the rural ladies who operated safe houses, to the chateaux-dwelling aristocrats whose lawns played host to light aircraft smuggling collaborators in and out of France, it also is a fascinating essay on the gruesome realities of heroism: including moments of hopelessness and complete failure of nerve. Events test our group of collaborators, so that each one bumps up against his or her personal limit, as to what they are intelligent enough to understand, brave enough to endure, and determined enough to achieve. Excellently acted and directed, it is a classic uncompromising Melville thriller.

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12 out of 15 people found the following comment useful :-
Melville's Powerful Epic, 2 May 2006

Author: wglenn from Port Jefferson, NY

This is a tough, somber film that captures the absurdities involved in war, and, ultimately, in life. The French Resistance "heroes" in the story are never shown conducting sabotage or planned attacks against the Germans, as one would get in a traditional World War II movie. Instead, we follow their claustrophobic and paranoid lives as they move from one hiding place to another (or one prison to another), constantly hounded by those in power, haunted by their own actions and the inability to communicate with those dear to them. Melville shows us their doubts and questions as they deal with betrayal, cowardice, and the murky ethics of killing their own to preserve the larger good.

Every episode in the film seems to lead to a darkly ironic conclusion, and the meaninglessness of their efforts becomes almost overwhelming, except that, somehow, these ordinary people continue to offer resistance in the face of death, so that their heroism lies not in the ability to stop the Germans but in taking action at all while facing the abyss.

While the acting is excellent all around, Lino Ventura's performance as Gerbier deserves special attention. It's hard to imagine any other actor bearing the tremendous weight of this film as well as he does. Gabin, at an earlier age, might have had the physical and emotional strength, but I'm not sure he would've been capable of Ventura's unassuming portrayal, which is so necessary for his character. The "shadows" at the core of this tale are seriously dark, and Ventura's Gerbier is strong enough to face them, yet modest enough to realize he can't conquer them on his own. The only way the Resistance makes sense by the end of this film, is in the collective effort of its members. Similarly, each of us, individually, cannot conquer death, but we as a group of human beings can continue to live on. _L'Armée des ombres_ ultimately moves beyond a story of the French Resistance in World War II and serves as a powerful existentialist epic, with Ventura's performance responsible for much of the film's dignity and humanity.

As with _Léon Morin, prêtre_ (1961), another story set during the war, Melville seems more emotionally present in _L'Armée des ombres_ than he does in his policiers or noir pieces, and after seeing the film, his overall body of work suddenly seems much heftier. While the movie isn't as visually daring of some of his other works, it has a dark beauty all its own, and his pacing, editing, shot selection, and use of sound show him in great artistic control. Forty-eight hours after seeing it, I still find myself caught in its world.

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16 out of 23 people found the following comment useful :-
The great Melville strikes again, 15 December 2002

Author: kj_cassidy from Melbourne, Australia

No false heroic's in this ultra realistic portrail of anti-Nazi men and women during the occupation of France. Melville's actors have obviously been cast for being very ordinary and each performance from Ventura's lead to Reggianis almost cameo as a Barber add to the almost doco like feel. A magnificent film from the truly underrated master and one of cinemas true perfectionists.

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