Joyeux Noel

Writer/director Christian Carion ('Une hirondelle a fait le printemps' aka 'The Girl from Paris') is unafraid to write and create cinematic tales that touch the heart as well as the mind. 'Joyeux Noël' is a story of war and its effects on soldiers that goes far beyond sentimentality (or the opposite emphasis on brutality as found in American films) and offers the viewer insights to the responses of young men's minds to the monster of war and how they cope.

Based on a true story, the film opens with the usual callous killing among three groups of soldiers - German, French, and Scottish - who face an oncoming Christmas Eve in the trenches, the realities of fighting have precluded their getting time to retreat for air. But a miracle happens: among the Germans is a famous opera tenor Nikolaus Sprink (Benno Fürmann) who has aligned with his fellow troops in the trenches, hoping he can bring some minor sense of Christmas and understanding to them. His soprano partner Anna Sorensen (Diane Kruger) finds a way to be with him in the trenches on Christmas Eve, 1914. Meanwhile the disgruntle troops of all three sectors are planning meager festivities and a bit of relaxation even in the trenches as the bodies of the day's plunder lie in the snow of no man's land. We get to know the French Lieutenant Audebert (Guillaume Canet) and his orderly Ponchel (Dany Boon), the German head of the regiment Horstmayer (Daniel Brühl), and the Scots - especially the priest/medic Palmer (Gary Lewis).

Christmas Eve comes and the voice of Sprink (in reality the tenor Rolando Villazón) sings 'Stille Nacht', rising out of the trenches to sing in the open of no man's land. Soon he is accompanied by the Scottish bagpipes and the 'chorus' of the Germans, the Scots and the French. They all emerge, share gifts of champagne and other libations, and agree to a cease-fire in honor of the holiday. It is in this magic moment that the true personalities of these warring men surface and each is seen as a vulnerable puppet of the WW I, exchanging addresses to meet after the war. Anna Sorenson has managed to enter the scene and during a communal mass led by Palmer she sings (the voice is Natalie Dessay) an Ave Maria (composed by the film's composer Philippe Rombi): the lovers have previously sung a duet version of Bach's 'Bist du bei mir'. For that moment in time the horrors of war melt and the camaraderie of the men glows and is carried into Christmas Day when all three groups of soldiers agree to bury their dead together. Of course the brutality and ignorance of war re-engages and the leaders of the three groups enter camp and threaten courts martial and punishment for the troops' lack of military discipline. The film ends in a manner that leaves the audience able to integrate the happenings of that Christmas Eve on the futures of these men.

The script is superb, the cast is uniformly excellent, the sets and cinematography are creatively moody, and the musical score by Philippe Rombi is one of the finest in years: the ending song 'I'm Dreaming of Home' deserves to become a standard. Would that everyone could see this film, a bit of global hope in the cloud of the destruction that shadows our world right now. Highly recommended. Grady Harp

Last night I went to special screening of Joyeux Noël ahead of it's release on 22nd of December.

Wow, what an amazing movie. As a rule I generally tend to blacklist war movies but this so different.

This is in no way about the glorification of war but instead tells a tale of a group of human beings that see past their differences for one night.

Apparently all based on true events known as the The Christmas Truce of 1914.

I highly recommend this movie to any and all.

I was looking forward to finding out how this historical yet forgotten event would be put to film, and how accurately it would be depicted. I am not disappointed. This evokes emotion without ever slipping into sentimentality or sap. It personalizes without robbing the true occurrence of attention. There is focus put on certain characters(all of which are quite well-written), but never to the point of such being lost on what really happened. The plot is great, and develops well. Some liberties are taken with the story, and they are not all justified, but the core is kept intact, and this manages to both tell what happened and make us feel and care about it. The overdubbed singing could have been subjected to better synchronization, but there is little to any criticisms directed at the acting itself. The same goes for the production value. The technical aspects of this are excellent, as well. The cinematography and editing are just about flawless. Pacing is rather good. Writing and directing are commendable. All three sides each speak the actual languages, adding to the already well-established sense of realism. I recommend this to anyone interested in the period, and the specific situation in particular. 8/10

Thanks to a special showing as one of the events to mark the centenary of the Alliance Française in Canada's capital, I had the privilege of attending a North American premiere of this remarkable film just two days before today Remembrance Day (Veterans Day in the U.S.) Both an appropriate theme and a cinematic Christmas gift come early. I think it may become my top film among several hundred seen this year, just as A Very Long Engagement - also set in the trenches of the First World War - captured my heart and critic's choice last December. Writer-director Christian Carion and all the actors do an amazing job in this multi-country Euro co-production. It should appeal not only to audiences across that continent but to film goers around the world. In addition to presenting a parable from real life relevant for any war-torn age, including our own I might add, Carion works wonders with front-line incidents great and small while drawing compelling individual character portraits from a top notch Scots, French and German cast, each speaking in their native language and accents. That goes for even relatively smaller roles: for example, that of the junior German officer at the front, Lieutenant Horstmayer (ironically a Jew who recalls a Paris honeymoon with his French-speaking wife), as played by the superb young actor Daniel Brühl (Goodbye Lenin, The Edukators). There is so much more that could be said about this remarkable and timely movie with a timeless message. Even had France not chosen Joyeux Nöel as its selection for the 2006 Oscar best foreign-language film category, I would herald it and rejoice in the advent of a new classic that is in another class altogether from the general run of "holiday movies". A story of harsh truths as well as transcendent art, it finds humanity and hope in the midst of battlefield horrors. Seasonal glad tidings indeed!

Wow! Joyeux Noel was a great movie. I wasn't sure if I was going to like this film but found it to be moving, heartwarming and a wonderful cinematic experience.

The fact that the story is based on real events that happened shows that their is some good in humans across the world. In this story, all sides are respected as humans and the soldiers come to understand that under God, we are all one.

Please, even if you don't normally go to foreign language films or war movies, go to this film. The war scenes are not prolific. You will come out changed and smiling from the inside out!