Irie212
I had seen The Statement when it was released 14 years ago, and I remembered it as dull and, well, unmemorable. But when it turned up streaming, I decided to give it another try, largely because of the story, but also the cast. On second viewing, the performances do not disappoint. Unfortunately, they are not showcased in a well-crafted or well-conceived movie. NB: Serious spoilers follow. Also, first, two caveats.1. The film is based on the Brian Moore novel of the same name, which itself is based on the life of a Nazi collaborator named Paul Touvier. I haven't read the novel, but in the film, the dramatic ending is complete fiction, because Touvier died of prostate cancer in prison. In fact, from what I've read of Touvier-- who was a thoroughly despicable man-- this film is fictionalized almost beyond the bounds of historical fact.2. Though it was filmed in the South of France, the movie is British and Canadian. It takes an Olympic leap of faith to accept players from Alan Bates to Tilda Swinton to Ciaran Hinds as French, and no one more so than everybody's favorite Cockney lad, Michael Caine, as Pierre Brossard (the fictional Touvier), but it's a crucial leap, so limber up. When we meet Brossard, he is still haunted by his war crime, which is shown in black- and-white flashbacks: in 1944, he executed seven Jews near Lyon. My problems began there, because I didn't believe in his contrition. Instead, I suspect that the filmmakers attached the flashbacks to his memory just as a convenient way showing the crimes and therefore conveying the gravitas of his actions to the audience. His contrition, if any, is also inconsistent with the rest of Brossard's character, but it does have the added benefit of making his ardent Catholicism a critical element of the plot But never mind. Let's say he was haunted. He is also now hunted, because of a new law about "crimes against humanity" which makes him retroactively a criminal. Unfortunately, that raised the next problem. I felt almost no suspense in what is inherently a suspenseful story- - a hunt. We naturally wonder, of course, if Brossard will escape, but this is a tedious film. The opening sequence sets the pace. Grey- haired and sweater-vested, Brossard is spotted in a cafe by an assassin. Brossard drives off, the methodical assassin follows, and they meander along, up into the hills around Aix. We watch them for several minutes, with one or two other cars coming and going. Close- ups are mixed with aerial shots, but there is no energy, and without energy a chase scene is a traffic update.The one suspenseful scene, oddly, has little to do with somebody being hot on somebody else's tail, although there is a tail. Brossard seeks refuge with his estranged wife (Charlotte Rampling), who dotes on the dog he had given her years ago, an aging pet he threatens to kill if she doesn't help him. My suspense-meter started spinning in that scene, but nothing comes of it. (As an aside, couldn't it have been a new puppy? Just to have something bouncy in the movie?) Even when he's escaping over rooftops, I found myself wondering if the old guy would slip and fall rather than if he'd be caught or shot. When he stops to catch his breath and check his watch while he's making a getaway, I checked mine, too. Lest this review seem like a simple lament that Norman Jewison is not Alfred Hitchcock, let me quickly change gears: I'm not looking for Bullitt-esque chase scenes. Nor do I care if the actors are, as one IMDb reviewer said, "long in the tooth" (Who did he expect to see in a movie about people surviving 50 years after World War II? A Daniel Craig, or even Radcliffe?) Let me, as they say, cut to the chase:The characters are necessarily geriatric, but the film didn't have to be. More time could and should have been spent on motives and methods of the chasers than on the tiresome chase itself. Whether they're out to get Brossard or to shelter him, the complexities, and indeed the morality of the motives, are not fully explored, though they involve fascinating factions: First, the French government (Jeremy Northam as a police colonel, Tilda Swinton as a jurist, Alan Bates as a minister, John Neville in an unspecified role of power). Second, fellow survivors of the Vichy regime, who are also in danger of being hunted, or betrayed by Brossard if he is caught and successfully interrogated or manipulated. Third, there is the suggestion that a faction of Nazi hunters are in play, but this is muddy. Fourth, and perhaps most profoundly, the Catholic church, in whose picturesque abbeys Brossard finds protection as a devout and at least superficially penitent believer. That is, until Rome cuts him off. That is where the focus should have been-- on the conflicting motives of these factions, years after the war-- because in effect, Brossard was finally nothing but a pawn caught helplessly in the forces of history. But this film has no force, and is disappointingly vague on history.
blanche-2
Michael Caine plays a Frenchman, Pierre Broussard, who collaborated with the Nazis during the war in "The Statement" from 2002. He is now an old man and in hiding, using another name, as he was arrested after the war and managed to escape. He is accused of killing 7 Jews, and this is shown in flashback. Now he's been hunted by two groups: vigilantes who intend to execute him, and the law, led by a judge (Tilda Swinton) and her associate (Jeremy Northam) who seek justice.Broussard, a devout Catholic wanders from one Catholic abbey or monastery to another seeking refuge; he also receives money from yet another group, fellow collaborators, I think. When they find out he's being hunted, no one wants anything to do with him, and he winds up staying with his wife (Charlotte Rampling) who hates him. Then he's on the run again, in ill health and finding it more and more difficult to find people who will help him.Michael Caine is excellent in this role of a frightened, pathetic old man who is constantly praying and wants to die in a state of grace. His patron saint is St. Christopher - I'm not sure when the book this is based on was written, but I thought St. Christopher had been kind of defrocked or something. Wrong saint.Tilda Swinton and Jeremy Northam have supporting roles and not much to do in them. Alan Bates, Ciaran Hinds, and William Hutt are also part of the film. The scenery is beautiful.This movie could have been much better. First of all, it was a little confusing; secondly, there was a lot of talk about this Chevaliers group, but I don't think anyone ever came out and said what they were about. In the end, I felt like it was a superficial telling of this story.Someone here mentioned a newspaper review complained because no one in the film spoke with a French accent. This is mentioned in practically every movie set in another country by someone, but this is the first time I've heard a newspaper reviewer mention it. You don't need an accent; these people are speaking their own language, not English with an accent. How come no one questioned it in Ben Hur? Do theater-goers insist that Chekov be done with a Russian accent and that in A Doll's House the actors use Swedish accents? Is Hamlet performed with Danish accents? Why is this so hard to grasp that a newspaper reviewer would mention it? I'd love to know who they're hiring these days.Anyway, this movie was a lost opportunity by director Norman Jewison. It's just not as good as it could have been.
vitaleralphlouis
This movie can be enjoyed for its high production values, excellent acting (particularly Michael Caine and "ice queen" Tilda Swinton), and looking at the wonderful on-location photography of Europe. Unfortunately the primary purpose of this box office dud was to create still another re-write of World War II in Europe to focus on the Jews, the Jews and nothing but the Jews.Literally hundreds of movies have now been made to weave the misconception that the war was about the Jews. It was not. It WAS about the invasions of Czechoslovakia, Poland, France, the bombing of Rotterdam with 20,000 buildings destroyed in 20 minutes, the V-2 rocketing of London, the enslavement of thousands, horrible medical experiments, et cetera. Yet an entire generation has been taught that the be-all and end-all of WW II was the Jews. Even in the context of this film, the focus is on 7 Jews shot by the Vichy government. 7 Jews! What about the millions of French citizens betrayed by Vichy? Hmmm! The second propaganda agenda is to pretend the Catholic Church was sympathetic to the Nazis. Taint so, McGee.
