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Must See Movie...

Brilliant and touching

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

A film with more than the usual spoiler issues. Talking about it in any detail feels akin to handing you a gift-wrapped present and saying, "I hope you like it -- It's a thriller about a diabolical secret experiment."

The heart of the story is fatally flawed by an idiotic premise which negates an otherwise decent movie. We are told a mother betrays her son to the Nazis -- an act of lunacy or depravity which is not explained or supported by the rest of the movie.The movie is presented as a series of flashbacks. These flashbacks jump back and forth among several different time periods; they seem more like gimmicks than useful tools for telling the story. A flashback to one previous time should have been enough to show the family secret.Watching this movie leaves one with the feeling that the director and writer are obtuse or that they think the audience are.

Though the story told is autobiographical, and tragic, you don't have to care much at all for a couple of the main characters. I found two reasons to loath this movie: 1. The first wife, Tania, so deeply disturbed when she learns of her husband Maxime's attraction to her sister-in-law Hannah, violates her deepest maternal instincts, i.e. to protect her young son Simon, by masochistically revealing herself to be a Jew to the Vichy police (they subsequently perish in an extermination camp).....and only a mile away from safety! Grotesque human behavior by all three of these adults makes them impossible to relate to. 2. Casting anomalies: Jumping back and forth over decades the actors cast look the same age most, if not all of the time. Which confuses the viewer repeatedly about chronology. ( I suppose in the case of the too-old-to- begin-with Patrick Bruel (Maxime), the director just accepted this reality while looking at dailies by rationalizing, "If the audience is going to get hung up over his looking too old then they're not really into the story!" Oh yeah director Miller: Bruel was too old looking in 1937 and looking exactly the same....too old.....twenty years later!) Overall conclusion: This movie reduced the horror of the French-Jewish experience of the Holocaust to a sordid love triangle. Yuch!

SPOILER: A recurring thought: Old Maxime, who had accepted the loss of his first son and wife, was inconsolable about losing his dog (because he chose to walk the dog without a leash and it was run over), and the dog's death served to displace all of the angst he had repressed from similar earlier matrimonial irresponsibility. Claude Miller emphasized this over and over and over. The persistent eying of Tania at his own wedding and many subsequent scenes left no doubt that Maxime should have been a prime candidate for self-flagellation. Since he never demonstrated subsequent shame or regret, humanity gets to at least see how such guilt can still enter into one's life even if only the pangs of guilt through mindless displacement in the form of the dog incident. Maybe this movie should be an iconic cinema graphic reference for wandering spouses to consider while they visualize themselves as "taking the leash off" to allow beauty to trump all those ideals that are actually being dumped along with the death of a good relationship. But just like other movies that demonstrate the fallibility of mankind regarding the temptation of beauty, at the risk of losing all ideals weaspire for ourselves and our children, we are brought to bear the same emotions and attractions that are difficult to withstand. Jean Seberg in "Lilith", Emmanuelle Seigner in "Bitter Moon", Julia Roberts in "Pretty Woman", etc provide worthy examples. "Match Point" also demonstrated how a poor guy who is lucky enough to marry a fairly good looking very educated woman from a very wealthy family is charmed by beauty enough to leave his wife and lose everything. "A Secret" ranks up there with those movies that force you to grapple with lustful and selfish feelings felt by Maxime. Perhaps such movies should be included in a behavioral modification course for family therapy. But this movie shows little poetic justice for Maxime as he only suffers guilt from his irresponsibility with his dog and not from his excessive lust for Tania. In the end, he is unable to associate his inconsolable dog death feelings with the fact that he set in motion the loss of his family during precarious wartime conditions. Some people have no guilt nor insight, like Maxime. Many of the rest of us are fighting the magic of beauty and should know better. Chazz

It's worth noting, if you have read other comments, that the people who have bad mouthed it actually had no idea what was going on, why things happened and who was who. I find this "solidly" irritating.This movie was great from start to finish. Tania is married to Robert. Robert is Hannah's brother. So Tania and Hannah are sisterS-in-law. From first meeting, Maxime is mesmerized by Tania and who wouldn't be. As Louise says "... I find her desirable ...". Cécile De France is superbly cast as Tania and every credit to the film makers for making her that object of desire in every scene. This alone makes the movie a delicious treat. I have not read the book. The movie is a tragedy of war and a masterpiece of the senses.Spoilers follow: Robert is sexy enough himself, there is no reason to suspect that Tania would ever wander. Robert is sent to a POW camp early on, so WE know he's not likely coming back ... but THEY do not. Hannah has seen the way Maxime looks at Tania but Tania makes it perfectly clear to Maxime that nothing is going to happen between them. However, Hannah doesn't know this. Hannah is a young mother with quite normal insecurities and a little irrational jealousy. Hard to avoid these feelings when you see Cécile in this movie. Any woman would be jealous. Maxime's devotion to his wife and son are never in question over his simple obsession with Tania. He loves his wife, he lusts after Tania. Maxime also alienates Hannah's parents by refusing to register as a Jew. Hannah goes behind Maxime's back and registers herself.The tragedy lies in Hannah's doubts and subsequent anger over what she "thinks" Maxime "feels" for Tania. This is compounded when her parents are transported. When she finds out that Tania will also be in their hiding place, she becomes even more frustrated at her position and doesn't want to leave Paris. Her act of "outing" herself as a Jew is simple rebellion and disobedience directed at Maxime. Nothing more. Herein lies the awful tragedy of the war. The major point to remember here is that as you sit watching this unfold, YOU know immediately what will happen to her and Simon, but she did not. The full horror or the holocaust was not revealed until after liberation so none of these people can know their fate in reality. At worst, she probably thought she would meet up with her parents somewhere else. At best she was showing Maxime she would do as she pleased.This tragedy was the highlight of the movie for me. It was such a simple act of disobedience that changed everyone's lives forever.It is a haunting wonderful film that leaves you thinking about it long after it has finished.