Memoir of War

5.4

393

Ratings

Add to lists

Original title

La douleur aka

AKA

Memoir of War

Year

2017

Running time

127 min.

Country

France

Director

Emmanuel Finkiel

Screenwriter

Emmanuel Finkiel (Novel: Marguerite Duras)

Cinematography

Alexis Kavyrchine

Cast

Mélanie Thierry, Benoît Magimel, Benjamin Biolay, Shulamit Adar, Grégoire Leprince-Ringuet, Emmanuel Bourdieu, Elsa Amiel, Anne-Lise Heimburger, Patrick Lizana, Joanna Grudzinska, Caroline Ducey, Salomé Richard, Bertrand Schefer, François Prodromidès, Stanislas Nordey

Producer

Co-production France-Belgium-Switzerland; Cinéfrance 1888 / Les Films du Poisson / KNM / Versus Production / France 3 Cinéma / Need Productions / Same Player / Proximus

Genre

Drama | Biography. 1940s. Nazism

Movie Groups

Marguerite Duras' Adaptations

Synopsis / Plot

When she finds two old notebooks in a forgotten box, Marguerite Duras remembers her past and the unbearable pain of waiting. In the 1944 Nazi-occupied France, the young and brilliant author is an active Resistance member with her husband Robert Antelme. When he is deported by the Gestapo, she throws herself into a desperate struggle to get him back. She develops a chilling relationship with local Vichy collaborator Rabier and takes terrible risks to save Robert, playing a cat-and-mouse game of unpredictable meetings all over Paris. Does he really want to help her? Or is he trying to dig up information about the anti-Nazi underground movement? Finally the war ends and camp victims return, an excruciating period for her, a long and silent agony after the chaos of the Liberation of Paris. But she continues to wait, bound to the torment of absence even beyond hope.

Awards: 2018: César Awards: 8 Nominations inc. Best Film & Director

2017: San Sebastian Film Festival: Official selection

Critics' reviews

"The film is most artful as an interior evocation of a preemptively grieving state of mind. If, at over two hours, it is an undeniably onerous watch"

Guy Lodge: Variety
"Finkiel's chosen narrative structure feels distinctly lopsided (...) Thierry is utterly convincing and compelling from first to last"

Neil Young: The Hollywood Reporter
"Mélanie Thierry is a brilliant Marguerite Duras (...) [A] compellingly austere adaptation"

David Ehrlich: IndieWire
"Thierry plays Marguerite with an understatement that can be enigmatic, seductive, or deliberately confounding. The picture as a whole doesn’t do justice to her committed performance."

Glenn Kenny: The New York Times
"A generic, thoughtless adaptation of Marguerite Duras (...) [It] reduces colossal events to dramatic simplicities and trivializing shortcuts"

Richard Brody: The New Yorker
"A harrowing tale of absence and shame (...) Skillfully directed and beautifully acted (...) Thierry is a revelation as Marguerite"

Dustin Chang: Screen Anarchy

Movie Soulmates' ratings: Register so you can access movie recommendations tailored to your movie taste.
Friends' ratings: Register so you can check out ratings by your friends, family members, and like-minded members of the FA community.

Is the synopsis/plot summary missing? Do you want to report a spoiler, error or omission? Please send us a message.
If you are not a registered user please send us an email to info@filmaffinity.com

All copyrighted material (movie posters, DVD covers, stills, trailers) and trademarks belong to their respective producers and/or distributors.

For US ratings information please visit: www.mpaa.org www.filmratings.com www.parentalguide.org