The release date couldn’t be more apt. France declared war on Germany September 3 1939 and the rest is history. That history is brought to astonishing life in Antonin Baudrey’s DE GAULLE – RESISTANCE.
General Charles De Gaulle fought against the German’s in the first eight months of the war and then fought against his country’s capitulation to the Nazi’s, forming a Free French government in exile in England.
Simon Abkarian plays De Gaulle as a man poor on personal people skills but imbued with a persuasive passion for his country that rallies a great proportion of his compatriots to resist the Nazi occupation of his homeland. There is a patriotic piety at play in this performance, a tunnel visioned deliberation on liberation tat drags a bedraggled army back into the breach.
Simon Russell Beale portrays Winston Churchill who recognises a kindred spirit in the infuriating Frenchman. Their discussions, deliberations, disagreements are dynamic dramatic dynamite.
The political football that underlies the fate of the world is given intelligent examination, the strategies and tactics that both strain and strengthen alliances assume the space of fiction within historical rigour.
The fire and bite of battle are brilliantly bespoke, especially in the decisive desert action where outnumbered at a garrison in Bir Hakeim under General Marie-Pierre Kœnig, French troops inspired by De Gaulle hold out against Rommel’s superior forces, giving British forces a chance to retreat and regroup.
DE GAULLE – RESISTANCE is not without its humour. Two fishing rods and a plumber are part of its retinue of lightening the darkest hours depicted.
This monumental movie drives straight to those emotions of soil and sovereignty, a synthesis of the savagery of war and the need to defend freedom. Nearly ninety years on, Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose .
