Watch Lacombe, Lucien For Free

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

The acting in this movie is really good.

One of the top 3 films of Louis Malle, Lacombe Lucien, named in bureaucratic fashion is a film of many layers. Perfectly cast and done with precision and minuscule eye for the period detail, this picture is like all of Malle's best work, an aesthetic picture novel. Malle did his best in casting Pierre Blaise as a main character, showing with an emotionless face the deepness of the void in his soul. Sadistic and cruel, murdering small animals and decapitating chicken with ease, Lucien is a text book example of the deviant character without any moral scruples, left out of his mother's emotional care and show of love. He wanders in a moral wasteland of his life and ends up just where he is supposed to be, a French Gestapo unit, Lucien joins not only in a wrong place, but at the wrongest of times to be serving the German Nazi regime (June 1944). It's a motley crew full of shady characters, racists, bigots, one of which is even black and politest of them all, former actresses in insignificant films, and a dog, all of them some sort of has-beens trying to do harm to the world they're also left out of.Lucien knows no love, no compassion, no human emotion, and it shows perfectly on his face, not until he meats a Jewish girl, called France (of all names),the daughter of Albert the tailor who survives the madness of the war doing his job for everybody even the collaborationist that is out to get him. He is aware of his guilt and willingly pays for it. Lucien finds out about love, but in the process he also learns about human emotions and even manages in one brief moment to separate right from wrong. Too little to late, as it shows, but the point Malle wanted to make in this movie is right on the spot. Humanity is a strange beast. Fantastic.

A tragic page in the history of France is examined in this disturbing account about the rise of a young man who went to the enemy's side after being rejected to join the resistance movement. Lucien, a peasant youth with no future, is stuck as a janitor in a old folks home, which he clearly hates. At home, Lucien has to put up with the indignity of seeing his own mother who is having an affair with the landlord of the farm where they live, while the father is held prisoner by the Germans.All along, one can witness a mean streak in Lucien. We watch him pull his sling shot to kill a small bird senselessly. He is an avid hunter, as witnessed when he goes after rabbits, something that in the war torn country comes in handy. We also see him beheading a chicken at the farm. The only way to go, in his mind is by joining the traitors that are collaborating with the invading Germans.Jean-Bernard, one of the French collaborators, decides to show Lucien the ropes of his new chosen career. It is Jean-Bernard who is in Lucien's eyes a role model, who introduces him to a life style he was not used to. Taking Lucien to get a new suit, the young man meets Horn, a Parisian tailor, who happens to be a Jew. Horn is hoping Jean-Bernard will be able to smuggle with his older mother and his daughter France into neighboring Spain.Lucien becomes obsessed with France Horn, a beautiful young woman, who happens to be an accomplished pianist. Realizing he can bully Horn in doing whatever he wants, Lucien moves into their apartment, beginning an affair with France, who is repulsed as well as in awe of the power Luien exerts over herself and the family. Lucien commits the ultimate sin by turning Horn over the Germans and to a sure death, but has second thoughts when a German soldier comes for France and her grandmother.Louis Malle film, seen for a second time, still holds one's interest. The story is one of many accounts in how French citizens turned against the less fortunate French Jewish population. It is also a tale about the cruelty of a young man that enters a world where otherwise he would have never been admitted had it not been because his determination to impress his newly found friends. Lucien relished in watching the school teacher being tortured by his allies. Mr. Malle examined the life of a young man without real convictions, political, or otherwise, who became a monster that stopped at nothing to get what he wanted. The director's coup was casting a non professional, Pierre Blaise, for the pivotal role of Lucien Lacombe. Unfortunately, the young man with a future in front of him, died tragically in an automobile accident. Aurore Clement shows a luminous quality in her way for bringing her tragic character France Horn to life. Ms. Clement was at the height of her beauty, something that comes across in her work in the film. Swedish actor Holger Lowenadler plays Albert Horn with dignity. The actor was perfect as the Jewish tailor. Therese Giehse, a German actress is seen as the older Bella Horn. The supporting cast does excellent work for Mr. Malle."Lacombe, Lucien" is one of Louis Malle's best films among his distinguished career in the cinema.

When initially released, the film was judged harshly by critics from the left because of its "non-judgmental stance toward collaboration". Some of the commentators wrote that "Indeed, the film offers no psychological interpretations but is content to simply show what happened in almost Bressonian fashion." I strongly disagree with these opinions; right from the opening scene where Lucien stops washing the floors of the hospice where he works to take out a sling shot and shoot down a singing bird, an obvious act of cruelty that defines Lucien's character at the very beginning of the film. Lucien is aware of the fact that what he's doing is wrong; he slants a sideways look to check if anyone's observing him. This strong statement about Lucien character is no coincidence. Throughout the movie there are other scenes where Lucien's nasty personality comes out: his betrayal of the school teacher who refused to let him join the resistance movement, his abuse of power, his bullying of the Horn family etc., and toward the end of the movie when the German soldier takes the pocket watch Lucien stole, Lucien kills him to take it back! Louis Malle taints handsome Lucien's character with the worst of human characteristics; he is cruel, rude, jealous, a looter and a thieve, a snitch, a coward, a bully and finally, a murderer who shoots someone in the back. Malle could have not have offered better psychological interpretations.

Lucien Lamcombe is the title character of this story about a French teen who joins the German police on a lark during the last year of WWII. A short time earlier, he'd volunteered for the Resistance but was rejected--why he so willingly joined the Nazis was tough to decipher--as were his motives apart from that as well as his inner world. In fact, the young man is like a puzzle with several missing pieces--he just exists and seems to have no depth or much personality--much like the main character in Albert Camus' "The Stranger". He IS--and that's about all you can say about this rather bland and amoral character.Despite the war having been over for nearly three decades, this film apparently did not do well in France. Perhaps they just didn't want to be reminded that many "good people" willingly collaborated or maybe the wounds were just too fresh.I liked the film and recommend it, though I must admit director Malle's style is quite unusual and nothing like a Hollywood product. It isn't just because the title character is so amorphous, but the entire story of the film. While there is a little music here and there, it's generally a very quiet film with many long camera shots where not a lot occurs--and seems quite "arty" as a result. Also, there is so much vagueness about the final portion of the film. It just ends very abruptly and there is a slapped on summary of what happened next--almost like they were saying "scene missing here" and instead of re-filming it they just gave a summary of would have been the final ten minutes or so. To me, this was very dissatisfying--particularly because there was no mention of what happened with the girl or her grandmother. Perhaps because the film already was quite long (about 140 minutes), they just decided to end it this way to save costs for film! Whatever the reason, this brought the film from an 8 to a score of 7. An unusual, compelling and odd film--there certainly isn't much like it out there.UPDATE--I spoke with a friend about this film and the more we talked, the more I now realize that what I didn't like about this film (even though it is still a good movie) is that the main character is not consistent nor does he seem to have any depth. Because he is so immature and bland, I could imagine someone seeing this film and actually feeling sorry for or at least excusing his evil. No matter how "nice" he becomes later in the film, his actions are inexcusable and I didn't want to connect with him and I found this a bit disturbing. Still, it is an unusual and thought-provoking work.