L Armée des Ombres

Star Review

A key work in Melville's oeuvre, L'Armée des Ombres (Army of Shadows) finally makes its appearance on DVD and is an essential, simply unmissable film that the French news magazine L'Express called ‘perhaps the best French film ever made on the Resistance’. Melville claimed that it was intended as a 'retrospective reverie…a nostalgic pilgrimage' to a period which had profoundly marked his generation. Such claims are perhaps surprising in reference to a film which, far from presenting presenting an elegiac, stirring view of the French Resistance movement is sombre, melancholy, and at times chillingly brutal. Melville could of course draw on his own experience in making the film, having himself fought for the Resistance.
Based on the 1943 novel by Joseph Kessel, the film is the last in Melville's 'war trilogy' on the subject of occupation, collaboration and resistance, coming after Le Silence de la Mer and Leon Morin, Prêtre. They can be favourably compared to the better-known war trilogies of Roberto Rossellini and Andrzej Wajda.
Set in 1942, L'Armée des Ombres tells of the clandestine activities of a group of resistance fighters (the 'army in the shadows') led by Lino Ventura, Paul Meurisse and Simone Signoret. At the time of its release, critics took issue with the way the director had presented his characters in the Resistance in the same way as the protagonists of his earlier gangster films such as Le Doulos or Le Samouraï. Melville's long-time obsession with the themes of solitude and betrayal and the 'futility of effort' is undoubtedly present. However, the film's grounding in historical fact lends it great power and resonance.
L'Armée des Ombres is a film about the impossibility of friendship in a world where one glance or the slightest carelessness could mean instant death. The film's most powerful moments - such as an excruciating torture scene, a dramatic escape from German capture and the unforgettable final sequence - derive from Melville's meticulous and precise direction of actors as well as his characteristically restrained mise en scène. Melville said that this was a film that he had wanted to make for 25 years, but that in the film, he 'ignored the legend'.

Pasquale Iannone on 6th November 2006

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Film Description

Melville's gripping adaptation of Joseph Kessel's seminal wartime novel has been praised as one of the greatest and the most authentic film portrayals of the French Resistance. The film follows a band of Resistance fighters living under German-controlled France. As the grip of the occupying forces tightens, friendships, trust and loyalty give way to secrecy, suspicion and loss.

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What a privilege to see Melville’s dark and disturbing masterpiece about the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France; This is not easy viewing -- the uncompromising refusal... more >

What a privilege to see Melville’s dark and disturbing masterpiece about the Resistance in Nazi-occupied France; This is not easy viewing -- the uncompromising refusal to celebrate the heroism of the Resistances still shocking, but it is a film to be seen, not least for Simone Signoret’s devastating performance. < less

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Related Special Offers

• An enticing selection of French Cinema

DVD Extras

• Commentary by Ginette Vincendeau
• "Le Journal et la Resistance" (1945, 33 mins) - a rare documentary from the Imperial War Museum, with commentary by Noel Coward
• Rare short film about Melville from 1968
• Illustrated booklet, including Cahriers du Cinema review.

Film Details

Cast

Lino Ventura, Simone Signoret, Jean-Pierre Cassell, Paul Meurisse

Technical Details