I could not prevent myself to think about Jean-Pierre Melville's masterpiece Army Of Shadows, treating of the same period, from the other side, the resistance movement, but nearly exactly in the same manner. The lead character is the other side of Lino Ventura" one Philippe Gerbier, a very ambivalent character, not a hero, nor a good guy, a person whom the audience can hardly knows what to think about. Here, the young milician, the young "traitor" is showed in the very same way. I love this. The tale of a man whose fate is already known in advance, a fate with no hope. The story of a fight lost in advance. The tale of a tragedy. and the depiction of those who collaborated with Nazis,and who behaved with their own fellow citizens in a far worse manner, has never been evoked before. But one last thing, was there really a Black milician among the collaborators?
Review of Lacombe, Lucien
