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The declaration of patriotism, told in voiceover, at the beginning of Robert Guédiguian's The Army of Crime is a matter of contention. Obviously said some time after their execution in 1944, a voice pronounces that those involved in the Affiche Rouge affair, in which members of the French Resistance were put on propaganda posters and labeled criminals, died for France. As much as it is true that the members of the Resistance depicted in the film were fighting for a free France, their backgrounds and political affiliation under the Communist banner suggest that they were fighting personal wars just as large as their encounters with the Nazis.
In fact, the Nazis are of decidedly little interest to Guédiguian compared to the French police who worked under and in collaboration with the Gestapo. It's the police that take Missak Manouchin (Simon Abkarian), a married poet and survivor of the Armenian Genocide, to a work camp where he is forced to sign a paper renouncing Communism under threat of being shot. They are the same police who take away the father of Marcel (Robinson Stévenin) and turn a blind eye to the plight of Mélinée (Virginie Ledoyen), Missak's devoted wife. Their indifference to the fascist state allows Thomas (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet) to be bullied at school and separates Olga (Olga Legrand) from her daughter.
These unwanted figures, whose backgrounds vary from Armenian and Hungarian to Spanish and Italian, form what would eventually be renamed the titular collective of "terrorists" that shot occupying soldiers and set off explosives at National Socialist gatherings. The film, written by Gilles Taurand and Serge Le Péron, is not so much a build-up to major retaliations -- though there are numerous, expertly crafted action sequences -- but a look at how these would-be refugees find their footing in a family of Marxist outcasts under the occupation. Missak, who takes the role of the group's chief, shares warm moments with several of the younger members in between planning attacks, a war-battered father figure to government-mandated orphans.
Whereas Missak's group is a diverse line-up, the police are personified in two forms: A villainous middle-man (Yann Trégouët) and a lonely inspector (Jean-Pierre Darroussin). Despite both characters having their respective big scenes, there's no hiding the fact that Guédiguian is morally one-sided: The deaths of the Resistance are preceded by a myriad of tortures whereas the deaths of the SS are all quick and generally detached. But then, the higher-ups in the Resistance are likewise seen as cold, weak figures who care for the cause and not the toll. Missak might have been the only truly conflicted character if the great Darroussin hadn't imbued his inspector with such a contemplative temperament.
Technically efficient and unwaveringly watchable, Guédiguian film's main asset remains Abkarian, an actor of seductive and soft-spoken intensity. While the filmmaking remains resolutely safe and even, Abkarian runs the emotional gamut without a false note, especially when he is faced with giving up his ethical stance against murder. Better and far more complex films about the French Resistance have been made -- few have stepped within range of Jean-Pierre Melville's epic Army of Shadows -- but The Army of Crime claims its own space by keeping focused on the dedicated unwanted and offering an uncommonly warm portrait of their passion for life.
Aka L'armée du crime.
In fact, the Nazis are of decidedly little interest to Guédiguian compared to the French police who worked under and in collaboration with the Gestapo. It's the police that take Missak Manouchin (Simon Abkarian), a married poet and survivor of the Armenian Genocide, to a work camp where he is forced to sign a paper renouncing Communism under threat of being shot. They are the same police who take away the father of Marcel (Robinson Stévenin) and turn a blind eye to the plight of Mélinée (Virginie Ledoyen), Missak's devoted wife. Their indifference to the fascist state allows Thomas (Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet) to be bullied at school and separates Olga (Olga Legrand) from her daughter.
These unwanted figures, whose backgrounds vary from Armenian and Hungarian to Spanish and Italian, form what would eventually be renamed the titular collective of "terrorists" that shot occupying soldiers and set off explosives at National Socialist gatherings. The film, written by Gilles Taurand and Serge Le Péron, is not so much a build-up to major retaliations -- though there are numerous, expertly crafted action sequences -- but a look at how these would-be refugees find their footing in a family of Marxist outcasts under the occupation. Missak, who takes the role of the group's chief, shares warm moments with several of the younger members in between planning attacks, a war-battered father figure to government-mandated orphans.
Whereas Missak's group is a diverse line-up, the police are personified in two forms: A villainous middle-man (Yann Trégouët) and a lonely inspector (Jean-Pierre Darroussin). Despite both characters having their respective big scenes, there's no hiding the fact that Guédiguian is morally one-sided: The deaths of the Resistance are preceded by a myriad of tortures whereas the deaths of the SS are all quick and generally detached. But then, the higher-ups in the Resistance are likewise seen as cold, weak figures who care for the cause and not the toll. Missak might have been the only truly conflicted character if the great Darroussin hadn't imbued his inspector with such a contemplative temperament.
Technically efficient and unwaveringly watchable, Guédiguian film's main asset remains Abkarian, an actor of seductive and soft-spoken intensity. While the filmmaking remains resolutely safe and even, Abkarian runs the emotional gamut without a false note, especially when he is faced with giving up his ethical stance against murder. Better and far more complex films about the French Resistance have been made -- few have stepped within range of Jean-Pierre Melville's epic Army of Shadows -- but The Army of Crime claims its own space by keeping focused on the dedicated unwanted and offering an uncommonly warm portrait of their passion for life.
Aka L'armée du crime.
