Captain Conan

This film is about how the military experience can transform a person, and no, it's not about the army making men out of boys.

Conan leads a group of trench cleaners, who, in reality, were thugs and pathological killers who enjoyed butchering their enemies after infiltrating their lines at night.

Problems emerge when the war is over, but some of these men cannot deal with their wartime homicidal pathologies and keep doing what they were trained for and mount a heist which results in killings.

Conan then has to choose between his camaraderie for his men and his responsibilities as an army officer.

This film has many originalities, especially in its war scenes and, I must admit, the whole thing is entertaining.

It's lengthy at times, but Torreton gives a great performance and really deserved the Cesar for best leading role that he got that year.

It is, in my knowledge, the only film which treats of that very particular post-World War I episode, when the "Reds" tried to invade Bulgaria and the French came to stop the expansion of what was not yet know as the Soviet block.

Captain Conan is about... Captain Conan and his unit get sent to Bucharest? After the armistice for the Macedonian Front has signed and during this time, the men get restless which causes crime from Conan's unit to spread around the place as; Norbert (Conan's close friend) becomes judge advocate and picked to court martial these men and, while his friendship with Conan slowly dissolves from this moment.

Review: The film is excellent at showing it's message on how war is bad in not shouting it out but, observing why it's bad as the film is firmly accurate with some humour from the cast But is slow.

This is in many ways a very good war film but not in the typical way. The film opens in the closing days of WW1 on the Eastern Front where Capitaine Conan (Philippe Torreton in a Cesar winning performance) leads a band of ruthless hand to hand fighters, equivalent to a modern special forces unit. They prove themselves far more effective than the regular army in the final defeat and are envied by many including a friend of Conan, Lt Norbet (Samuel Le Bihan, IIRC was nominated for a Cesar in this). But when the armistice is signed Conan and his men find themselves in limbo while Norbert, working for the Court Martials finds himself accusing the very men he admired for robbery and murder. This film does take a while to get going but it is worth it, giving time for the characters to develop and also establishing the monotony the soldiers find, going from combat to walking the streets of Bucharest. The film also deals with the beginnings of the Russian Civil War and the problem of soldiers fighting with no motivation. Tavernier's direction is superb and visually the film equals a number of classic war films while the performances help to give it an edge as it goes into territory that Hollywood war film's in particular have tended not to go into.

A great World War I film, arguably better than Kubrick's "Paths of Glory" and far superior to Mendes's "1917." More significantly, it is one of the best anti-war films as well for viewers who can dispassionately perceive it as such in the league of Malick's "The Thin Red Line." What surprises me no end is why critics rarely discuss this work with fine direction, scriptwriting and performances. To get a heroic soldier to aid a comrade who is a pacifist and not inclined to kill the enemy is described by this line in the script "Ask a dog to adapt to salad." The film applauds the heroics of the soldiers who win a war and at the same time chastises the bad deeds of the heroes. It also discusses the plight of soldiers who do not like to actively participate in the war and the decisions of top generals who are out of touch with ground reality. The following actors were a treat to watch: Samuel Le Bihan as Lt Norbet, Philippe Torreton as Captain Conan, and Catherine Rich as a well-bred lady with social connections, whose son is a soldier awarded capital punishment for being scared and for running away from battle lines. The fascinating tale is based on a novel by Roger Vercel. Tavernier was a director who could direct varied types of tales and make them well. What a talent!

One of the assistant directors to Tavernier was the Romanian director Cristian Mungiu who later won major awards at Cannes for his films: "4 Months, 3 weeks and 2 days," "Beyond the Hills" and "Graduation."

Conan and his men call their own shots on the battlefield and create fear within the enemy with their surprise attacks. By 1918, the mother of all wars comes to an end on the Bulgarian border. By this stage the men have had the taste of blood and cannot seem to settle down. When they are transferred to Romania for a bit of rest and recreation, a new battle commences with each other. The rules of combat have altered for the sake of peace and hypocrisy runs rampart to the disgust of Conan. At times, the style falls into dark humour territory, producing bizarre moments on the battlefield and words of wisdom on the human condition at war.