Armee im Schatten

La Resistance! One of Melville’s less known works, but all the better for it. About the French Resistance in Marseilles during Nazi occupation. What makes this movie so good as a whole? Is it the precise atmospheric directing, which in many of the scenes leaves you gasping for breath? Or the concert of acting where Lino Ventura is just the tip of the iceberg? Or the script which, just when you start to get the gist and understand a little, it comes up with something completely new? Or simply the knowledge that the movie is based on real events? There is no one reason, but all of the above and many other aspects make together completely perfect movie. Try as I might I can’t think of even one blemish. Really. (25.12.2007)

Within Melville's films, this is an exceptional piece, and the same can actually be said about the position of the title in world cinema. Melville's lifelong film passion was stylish crime films and the gangster genre with noir elements. In the case of Army of Shadows, he decided to process the partisan theme in a noir style. We learn only what is absolutely necessary about the heroes of the French resistance. Sabotage, shootouts with Nazis, and conspiratorial activities usually take place off-camera. The characters are characterized by economical dialogues and gestures. They are lonely illegal fighters who have been deprived of most emotions by dangerous activities and constant tension, but they have learned hardness and tenacity. They approach the task of executing a traitor with cold matter-of-factness. Expect long shots full of inner tension, but without spectacular scenes that would please the audience. You will see a film where gloom, coldness, and often cruel hopelessness prevail. Army of Shadows has nothing, I repeat: nothing, in common with popcorn; it will rather drain your energy rather than add to it. However, if you appreciate top-notch character acting, refined style, and excellent direction, do not hesitate to watch it. Overall impression: 85%. (16.10.2018)

Yet more proof of why I never acquired a taste for classic filmmaker Jean-Pierre Melville (with a single exception – Delon’s Le samouraï). Here, as in other works of his, the storyline is weirdly contrived, unnatural and implausible. Plus, I’m not afraid to say, in several scenes it is simply poorly directed and produced (the one where they are running into submachine gun fire, for instance; or: why do the beat-up union workers have to look like Romero’s decomposing zombies?). What’s more, the dramatic arc does not in any way justify the absurdly overblown length of this film, and I’m saying this as someone who likes his films to unfold slowly, on a low simmer. On the plus side, it’s always a pleasure to see Lino Ventura and Simone Signoret on screen. (08.02.2020)