93, rue Lauriston

This is very daring from the French channel Canal Plus to talk about this dark page of France, as this channel also produced SAC, another very hot subject to talk about; but I will comment SAC another time. Now, let's focus on this one. It is one hundred percent inspired from actual events, especially the Philippe Aziz book: TU TRAHIRAS SANS VERGOGNE - You will betray shamelessly. The story of Henri Lafont and his goons, all former gangsters and rotten police officers who served the nazi regime in France during the occupation. Those men were more powerful than the French genuine police, because they were covered by the German occupant. This is not a page of France history which French can be proud of. Everything said in this film is true and accurate. There is no moral, no ethics, no real lead character, but a bunch of "lead" characters. No hero, no good or real bad guy either. Samuel Le Bihan gives a very interesting performance as a lost dude who thought that he would find his path thru the French Gestapo, before realizing he was wrong. But it was too late. No cliché here, don't miss anything in this incredible but authentic page of shame for France. It was very daring, bold, for the French TV industry to talk about that. Yves Boisset could have made it.

During WW2, very few French people fought against the Nazi occupant, I mean from the beginning to the end. Many of them collaborated till 1943-44 and began to "turn their coats" against the Nazis, going forward to the resistant nets.... Typical French, opportunistic...French trademark, and I AM FRENCH MYSELF. I know what I talk about. But that doesn't remove anything to the sacrifice of those who gave their lives for our freedom. Nothing at all. But, I repeat, there were very few, compared to the bulk of French population who at first "admired" the clean, disciplined Nazi occupant, folks who suffered insilence, BUT NOTHING TO COMPARE WITH THE POOR RUSSIAN people. France was a vacation village for French, compared to the Soviets, whom Hitler wanted to annihilate, exterminate or at best make them slaves. So, back to this TV movie about the French Gestapo, the boss Henri Lafont was at first a gangster, an orphant who suffered hell all long his childhood, a man who fought against a society who wanted to destroy him. So when the Germans arrived in 1940 and offered him an opportunity to become some one powerful, of course, Lafont took the advantage and he was very skilled, charismatic, a real man, with the sense of leadership. He was only an opportunist. He was not genuinely Nazi, he helped many Jews, it was his human side, he punished many of his men who tortured innocent people. He could have been a resistant if this could have brought him wealth and power. But at his trial, no one defended him, I mean those people he helped, people he helped to get out occupied France. Those people did not come at his trial because they were afraid to be accused of friendship with Lafont.... Because after the French freedom in 1944, it was a real human slaughterhouse because of the people who collaborated tried to escape from their fate. And there were many of them,including powerful folks, from politics to bankers, artists, ministers.... Many people who eventually made it, and continued after the war. Because, In France, the new government wanted to forget and there were so many blackmail cases related to this dark side of French history. Shame side of France. This feature is very daring and rare.

This film is amazingly skilfully done, especially as it consistently sticks to facts, although everything is veiled in the euphemism of so called fiction, but the bones stick out of the well dressed flesh, and you can never hide the skeleton. It's a gruesome story with horrible ingredients of torture and brutal violence, all accentuated by unfortunately a most authentic cynicism giving the film a most inhuman character, but as it is so expertly done in total realism all the way you are fascinated and will endure it to the end, not with relish, but with constantly increasing interest and irresistible fascination. Michel Blanc plays the investigating police who after the war tries to get together some documentary of what the French gestapo really was busy about, interviewing many people with astounding objectivity - there is hardly room for any feelings or human upsets in this film, although the chapter is overwhelmingly upsetting. There are a few women who succeed in adding a human touch to the terrors with some emotion, but even the Jewess who gets away is stone cold and betrays nothing of her feelings. It's a great, amazing and admirable film penetrating thoroughly into one of the most revolting chapters of French history, and you will never forget this film for its sharpness.

Although I find mixing reality and fiction a very dangerous way of making movies, I would say this particular evocation of the French Gestapo was well done enough to be more than worth the viewing.

Excellent acting, handcrafted dialogs and efficient scenario allowed to draw a surprisingly deep and subtle picture of the bleak years of German occupation.

I especially liked the intentional absence of moral judgment or righteous bias. All the interpretation is left to the viewer, but the "facts" speak for themselves. The mechanisms that turn delinquents into collaborators and then into real monsters are well laid out for the audience to understand.

A refreshing change after all these caricaturing productions about dark spots in France's past.