‘Memoir of War’ (‘La Doleur’) Written and Directed by Emmanuel Finkiel
Emmanuel Finkiel’s haunting adaptation of seminal author Marguerite Duras’ semi-autobiographical novel The War: A Memoir stars a luminescent Mélanie Thierry in a riveting performance as Duras.
Mélanie Thierry (The Princess of Montpensier), Benoit Magimel (The Piano Teacher), Benjamin Biolay (Personal Shopper),Shulamit Adar (Kings & Queen, ‘Voyages’)
Music Box Films, one of the finest of the arthouse distributors will be releasing this emotionally complex story of love, loss, and perseverance against the backdrop of war. Memoir of War opens in New York August 17 at Film Forum and The Film Society of Lincoln Center, and in Los Angeles at the Laemmle Royal and at the Regal Edwards Westpark 8 in Orange County on August 24. Other cities will follow.
It’s 1944, and Duras is an active Resistance member along with her husband, writer Robert Antelme, and a band of fellow subversives in Nazi-occupied Paris. When Antelme is deported to Dachau by the Gestapo, she becomes friendly with French collaborator Rabier (Benoît Magimel) to gain information at considerable risk to her underground cell. But as the months wear on without news of her husband, she must begin the process of confronting the unimaginable. Through subtly expressionistic images and voiceover passages of Duras’ writing, Finkiel evokes the inner world of one of the 20th century’s most revolutionary writers.
Evocative in some ways of Hiroshima, Mon Amour which Duras wrote for director Alain Resnais and which was produced the French master, Anatole Dauman, the dream-like voice-over evokes a time which words can not describe. Rather the words take you on a meditative journey of the soul.
Opening as she says she found her journal of 1944 to 1945 written with a calm serenity which completely belied the chaos she felt within and without (“What I found was evenly filled pages, the letters tiny, extraordinarily placid and regular. What I found was phenomenal chaos of thought and feeling”) , the story moves as if in a dream until kicking in at 45 minutes to a suspense which is like watching a butterfly hanging ensnared within a nearly invisible spider’s web.
“Fear drives the blood from the brain”, Marguerite states, as she disassociates from herself in order to survive. Mélanie Thierry’s pale almost bloodless face and her pale blue eyes expressing exhaustion, fury, even a vicious amusement are counterbalanced by her strong determined jaw. A different role entirely from that of the gorgeous Princess of Montpelier, but in both she plays a woman in a very compromised position in which she must call up her inner strength and an acutely intelligent and intuitive way of maneuvering the men in power around her. (“This is a joke played on women”, she says, “so they feel you’ve saved their lives. Very Rue des Saussaies!”*)
French collaborator Rabier (Benoît Magimel) starts off like an innocent, the sort of good guy you might meet at an American football or baseball game. Innocent and yet, complicit with the Germans, he takes on an air of mafioiso and even comes to resemble Robert de Niro in Casino, Goodfellas or The Untouchables. To see the duet playing off each other’s weaknesses, using guile and guilt is worth the whole movie which sometimes goes on in an incredibly slow way. The slow pace and the constant cigarette were the weakest points for the film and tried my patience more than once but they epitomized the pain felt in waiting as expressed in the original French title, La Douleur.
“…ambitious and graceful…” Variety
Of course this film about French Resistance begs for comparison with the great 1969 masterpiece of Jean Pierre Melville, Army of Shadows. The colors here are different, lighter and airier rather than noir but the dark stones of the Parisian streets recall old Paris before it was cleaned up to what we see today and the band of Resistors gives you a sad hope in a humanity which is on the brink of destruction. Simone Signoret’s bulldogged approach to her role as a resistance fighter and that of Mélanie Thierry contrast with each other, one played with the heaviness of a Melville thriller, the other with a gossamer touch belying the strength of Marguerite. And this story goes on to the Liberation which does not liberate her as she waits for word of her husband.
The music, discordant and modern, punctuating moments is also unusual and noteworthy, by composer Nicolas Becker. Relieving the fearful atmosphere briefly is a wonderful musical interlude, elegant and decadent, with the 1940s favorite “J’Attendrai” (“I will wait”) played by rouged and mascara-ed musicians in a bistro crowded with happy Germans and collaborators.
One hour in and the Germans are gone, but the waiting and the pain of not knowing continues. Marguerite continues to be cared for by her husband’s best friend, played by Benjamin Biolay who has eyes like Benicio del Toro. Their relationship is more than that and their intimacy is revealed subtly as he allows her outbursts, the weightiness of her stress to abuse him on occasion; they both are committed to holding a fragile universe together until the end, using certain key phrases to remind themselves that there is hope.
Marguerite Duras was a highly successful novelist, memoirist, screenwriter, essayist and experimental filmmaker. Her script for Alain Resnais’ seminal film Hiroshima, Mon Amour earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Original Screenplay. She went on to write over 30 novels and direct 19 films. Duras won the Prix Goncourt (France’s most distinguished literary prize) for “The Lover.” “The War: A Memoir” (“La Douleur”) was written in 1944 and first published in 1985. The book has been translated and released in over 20 countries.
Award-winning writer-director Emmanuel Finkiel began his career as an assistant director to Bertrand Tavernier, Krzysztof Kieslowski, and Jean-Luc Godard. His first outing as a filmmaker, Madame Jacques on the Croisette, (I would love to see that film!) won a César Award for Best Short Film in 1997. His first feature length film, Voyages, which follows the travels of three elderly Jewish women whose lives were touched by the Holocaust, earned him two César Awards (Best First Film and Best Editing) and the Youth Award in Cannes. In 2008, he won the prestigious Jean Vigo Award for Nowhere Promised Land which debuted at the Locarno Film Festival. He has also directed documentaries including Casting (2001) and Je suis (2012). In fact, I would love to see all his films!
“Powerfully evokes … a crucial, often-mythicized moment of twentieth-century French history.”
— Stuart Liebman, Cineaste
“Mélanie Thierry leaps towards the front echelon of current French actresses with her riveting turn as Marguerite Duras.” — Neil Young, Hollywood Reporter
- Official Selection — 2017 Haifa International Film Festival
- Official Selection — 2018 Rendez-vous with French Cinema
- Official Selection — 2018 Atlanta Jewish Film Festival
- Official Selection — 2018 COLCOA French Film Festival
- Official Selection — 2018 San Francisco Jewish Film Festival
- Official Selection — 2017 San Sebastian Film Festival
Running time: 126 minutes. In French with English subtitles. Not rated.
Produced and distributed in France by Les Films du Losange, one of France’s most venerable producers as well as international sales agent and French distributor, TF1 took the role of international sales agent and has licensed the film to
- Music Box Films (2018) (USA)
- Hark (2019) (Japan)
- Imovision (2018) Brazil
- Kino Pasavaris (2018) Lithuania
- Les Films du Losange (2018) (France)
- O’Brother Distribution (2018) (Belgium)
- Pathé Films (2018) (Switzerland)
- Weird Wave (2018) (Greece)
- Funfilm Distribution (2018) (Canada)
- New Wave (2018) (U.K.)
Production Year: 2017
Release Date: 08/17/18
Countries of Production: Belgium, France, Switzerland
Languages: French
Running Time: 2h 7m
Screen Ratio: 1:85:1
Sound: Dolby 5.1
Color: Color
Rating: Not Rated
*Rue des Saussaies is a short (50m long) street in the 8th arrondissement of Paris that adjoins the Ministry of the Interior. It begins at place Beauvau and finishes at place Saussaies. At number 10, lived the comte de Ségur, Napoleon I’s master of ceremonies. At number 11, was the Gestapo headquarters for occupied Paris during World War II. Rue des Saussaies is a short (50m long) street in the 8th arrondissement of Paris that adjoins the Ministry of the Interior. It begins at place Beauvau and finishes at place Saussaies. At number 10, lived the comte de Ségur, Napoleon I’s master of ceremonies. At number 11, was the Gestapo headquarters for occupied Paris during World War II
