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To me, this movie is perfection.

So much average

Admirable film.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Entranced by his sadly near-forgotten 1953 title When You Read This Letter,I was intrigued to find out from a fellow IMDber that DVD company Masters of Cinema had put out a DVD/Blu-Ray of auteur Jean- Pierre Melville's feature debut,which led to me listening to the silence. The plot-France 1941:Wanting to not get too caught up in the Resistance battle against the Nazi Occupation,a man and his grown-up niece try to follow their daily routines. Crushing their will,the Nazi generals order them to take Werner von Ebrennac in as a "guest" who will come home after a long day working for the Führer. Whilst they have no say in him staying there,the man and the woman decide to stage a silent protest against him,which leads to Ebrennac filling the silence by exploring his most intimate feelings on the war and his love of the occupied country.View on the film:Offering an interesting booklet and detailed docs as extras,Masters of Cinema give an amazing transfer,with the audio and the visuals being pin-sharp,whilst retaining the natural grit from the film.Saying just a handful of words over 90 minutes,the alluring Nicole Stéphane gives an incredible performance as the niece, drawing in the most subtle change of facial and body language,from looking down at the floor like a statue,to longing close-ups letting Stéphane crack the ice from the niece's eyes. Bringing attention to detail in his smoke- hued performance, Jean-Marie Robain gives a haunting performance as the uncle,whose low shoulders and endless pipe smoking gives the uncle an unassuming appearance,which Robain cleverly uses to give the uncle's pragmatic mind-set a left-field mood. Holding his head high on the first night in the house, Howard Vernon gives a delicate performance as Ebrennac,whose Nazi uniform Vernon peels away to reveal the thoughtful,considerate man hidden under the beast. Made when feelings on the Occupation were still raw, Jean-Pierre Melville's adaptation of "Vercors" (real name Jean Bruller,who based the story on real events) underground short story delivers a message of understanding the individual,but finely not understanding/reasoning with the enemy. Sitting in silence, Melville takes advantage of the situation by giving the uncle a poetic narration expressing how deep his understanding of Ebrennac goes,and giving Ebrennac a blank canvas,which gets painted with the discovery that all of his optimistic beliefs are fatally wrong. Unafraid to open up feelings on the Occupation, Melville presents the uncle and nieces rebellion in a detached, passive manner,with neither of them looking outside the window for a Hollywood (in terms of heroics) resistance. Going French New Wave almost a decade before the movement existed, Melville went in an indie mode made visible by two non-union cinematographers quitting over his style,the production taking a year due to Melville's cash limits,and most of the movie being shot at Vercors own house. Largely keeping the screen limited to the three in the house, Melville breaks the theatrical trappings of the real location with deep,rich shadows and charcoal (natural) low- lighting casting a ghostly atmosphere over the title. Making his debut, Melville displays signs of the auteur vision that was to arrive with beautiful close-ups capturing the moment when the restrained emotion silently pours out.

Le Silence De la Mer (Jean-Pierre Melville) This slow burning World War II drama is based on the short novel of the same name about a German soldier, Werner Von Ebrennac, during wartime who lodges with a French man and his niece, Ebrennac is met only with silence.Throughout the film Ebrennac attempts to establish a connection to the French and periodically preaches his ideologies of alliances, the similarities between France and Germany, now and again he tells stories of his youth and his fears of the evil that people are capable of. Ebbrennac is attempting to gain empathy from the French, for them to view him as human, rather than an enemy since he admires France so much. Melville denies that this is his attempt to fix the frictional relationship between France and Germany, suggesting instead that the film is just a faithful adaption of the novel, evidenced by the films beginning which is a novel being opened, the film ends with the novel closing.The house in which most of the film takes place has a ghostly air, the nephew and niece act as though Ebrennac is never there. Ebrennac often drifts in and out of the house and talks to no reply. The film's style is a slightly infrequent, switching from basic narration to flashbacks. Nonetheless the film provides a good idea of French-German relationships during war and challenges peoples perspectives on the enemy. Melville inclines us to understand that the enemy are individuals that are being puppeteer-ed by dictatorial fascistic leaders and that occasionally one in a few aren't hateful. Although the film tends to be a bit slow at times for me and occasionally uninteresting. The film relies on its dialogue and so the photography is quite simplistic. Inspired metaphoric imagery sometimes sneaks into the movie such as the niece's scarf which features two hands reaching for each other (it looks like it could have drawn by Cocteau). The simplicity increases our awareness and exaggerates the slightest element of suspense, like hearing a pin drop in a silent room. The intense stares shared between characters speaks volumes more than any of the dialogue contained in the film. The slightest hand movement attracts attention.I feel that the movie is sometimes overdone because of its overly extended scenes of silence which didn't really connect with me, although they are important. This is a promising debut film that features great performances, realistic characters, a unique atmosphere and humanistic overtones.

In a small town in occupied France, the tranquil life of the occupants of a country house (an uncle and his niece) is disturbed when a new German officer, Lieutenant Werner Von Ebrennac is billeted and takes up residence in their home. Not wanting to be seen to be collaborating with the enemy they both agree not to let the foreign presence interfere with their everyday life and to this end they even refuse to acknowledge their new guest when he speaks to them. Von Ebrennac a musician and budding composer understands their stubbornness and each night he joins them in their living room and regales them with his stories, on topics such as his love of France, the influence of his father, the war and his passion for music, all of his thoughts and questions go unanswered by the uncle and his niece, he puffs on his pipe while she continues to knit, all the time never making eye contact with their unwanted guest. Privately they both seem to have a growing respect for Von Ebrennac,a learned, romantic and cultured man who imparts his knowledge of French literature with a vitality that can't help but enthuse the listener, he even resorts to wearing civilian clothes in order that his hosts feel more comfortable in his presence.After the fall of France to the occupying Nazi's, Jean Pierre Melville who fought in the famous battle of Dunkirk found himself demobbed from the French military and subsequently ended up in London where he tried to do his part for the French Resistance, it was there that his love of Cinema gave him his first inkling of what his first project would be, he wanted to adapt the infamous and iconic Resistance book, La Silence de la Mer by Vercors, After the war Melville approached Vercors looking for his permission to adapt his work, which was denied. Despite this setback Melville set out to make the film anyway, another problem that beset him was that he had no Cinematic training and in the highly regulated and unionised France this was going to be a sticking point if the film was going to be made, but his determination fuelled the project and soon Vercors was on board, after Melville made him an offer that the film would never be released unless it was accepted by an esteemed Resistance audience at a private screening and if it didn't compromise his book, of course the film was widely accepted with only one vote against. Melville strived for authenticity and even used Vercors' own home for the filming and also employed actors that had been in the Resistance.Jean-Marie Robain plays the Uncle and his voice is for the most part only heard in voice-over, both he and Nicole Stéphane's (the Niece) performances by their nature have to be very subdued and all emotion is shown with but the slightest of glances and hardly any movement. Vernon has nearly all the on screen speaking parts and the film is broken up into his ever more emotive musings on life that border on soliloquy and its his performance that holds together the film, when after a brief trip to Paris to meet some old friends, he returns devastated in the knowledge of the atrocities that are to happen and that have been happening, he must now admit to his hosts that his interpretations of his countries ideals have been erroneous. A sublime debut from Melville that influenced many of his fellow countrymen, like Bresson, Truffaut and Godard, with but the slightest hint of what direction his career would take, his gathering together of first timers succeeded in creating a film that bucked many of the filmic trends of the day and as such helps retain its freshness and power even today.

I am surprised that this movie is so little known (I must confess I did not know much about it either when I first went to see it). I think it is one of the best movies made in Europe in the first years after the WW2. It is quiet and simple, but very powerful at the same time. Without any killing or death in it, this film shows the absurdness and tragedy of war better than any other I have seen. At the same time, for me this was a very good insight in the spirit of French resistance. But above all, it is about a collapse of dreams, a conflict between one's conscience and ideology, and a realisation of how senseless human feelings, aspirations and the whole existence is made by the war. Very deep and impressive. I felt like crying at the end.