O Silêncio do Mar

And so Jean-Pierre Melville's career began with this very impressive feature debut. While not quite the same kind of film from him as I'm used to (keep in mind the only other Melville films I've seen are Le Deuxième Soufflé and Le Samouraï), it delivers every bit of quiet tension and restrained filmmaking I've come to love from this director. The vast majority of the film is either narration directly out of the book on which the film was adapted, or Howard Vernon delivering hauntingly beautiful monologues. Vernon's performance is flawless and never fails to draw you in. All of this great stuff aside,Le Silence de la Mer has some room to grow. Biggest issue being that it's basically a stage play. The medium is hardly utilized and it makes for a semi- dull viewing. This isn't the fault of Melville or anybody else, that's just what the source material calls for. As perfectly executed as Vernon's monologues were, I just can't help but feel that the story could have had so much more to offer. But this, again, is the fault of the author of the book, not Melville. All in all, Le Silence de la Mer is a very good start to Melville's career and definitely one not to let pass you by.

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.

Here's the set-up: an uncle and his niece (the latter Nicole Stephane, who would appear as the female lead in Melville's follow-up Les Enfants Terribles) are living in a small town in France and it's the early part of the war in 1941. A German officer is wounded and has to spend some time to heal (not serious enough for a hospital it would seem, but not strong enough to fight yet), and immediately things are tense as the French citizens refuse to say a word or even look up - their own form of silence as protest - but he doesn't mind.

Officer Werner von Ebrancc in fact will talk to them or, perhaps, in a way, to himself without any regard. For the most part, with maybe just one or two minor exceptions, we only hear the uncle in voice-over. Lots and lots of voice-over, narrating about things that we see on screen and what the officer's silence holds over moments, or when he does things like play the harmonium - a melody that his niece hasn't played in years. So much significance in six months or so of this man just *being* there. What will they do? Will communication finally happen vocally, or with physical gestures and things like hands?

I imagine it'll be the same for those who come to La Silence de la Mer that admirers (does one say fans perhaps) of Jean-Pierre Melville's other films, primarily his 60's crime thrillers or the other WW2 resistance epic Army of Shadows: this does not really seem very much like those later movies. In 'Silence', it's got wall-to-wall musical score for one thing by Edgar Bischoff; not a bad score by any means, but it is strange and sometimes the music is accompanying one of the many monologues delivered by the German soldier Werner, which is in contrast to many of Melville's films which lack music in favor of silence. And there is a great deal of narration from the French uncle (just credited as 'L'Oncle' played Robain) which is also in contrast with Melville's style. So it was a little jarring to come to his first film after seeing so many - this doesn't make it a bad thing, just different and unexpected.

The context always matters of course: this was made very soon after the end of the second world war, which Melville fought in and was part of the French resistance. The film's adapted from a book, which is pretty clear by not only the framing (like a Cocteau film of Beauty and the Beast, which gets checked here in reference by the way by Werner, it opens and ends with a book on screen), and it was a book that was kind of an underground release. Melville even adapted it without the rights, something that would almost make it a "fan-film" today, though Vecors liked it enough to let it see release following approval from a 'jury' (see the trivia). But the point is that the film must have been something important to see in France at the time, part of France looking back at what had happened to them, what they allowed, and of course the fervent, dastardly German/Nazi mind-set, and take some steps to move forward.

The narration may be too much at times (it's part of Melville's 'anti-cinematic' aesthetic in relation to adapting a book to the tee), and at first I was bothered by it. It made the film seem old and dated. But as the film went on and I got more into Vernon's performance, it seemed to make more sense about the tension and how, step by step, incrementally, there's a connection made between these very disparate characters. I also liked the last half hour where we see Werner outside of the house and at German HQ or talking with fellow officers and the contrast of his own awakening to culture and French artistic expression with the dogmatic nature of Nazism. It's even a braze and courageously made movie ultimately for how it posits the French civilians like these two (not so much characters but apt props for the narrative) and Werner, who is fleshed out and conflicted and kind of a tragic figure. It's a film the more I think about it I like more, even as it's not as impressive as Melville's later crime films. For what he had to work with (clearly a low budget, mostly shot in the house), Melville gets a lot out of his imagery and slow-build up.

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.

Jean-Pierre Melville was born Jean-Pierre Grumbach and took the nom-de-guerre Melville during his time with the French Occupation against Nazi rule during World War II. With the war ended, he struck out to become a filmmaker, being rejected by the actual French studios, and went independent, adapting the underground French novel by Jean Bruller as his first film, without Bruller's permission. The film is a very still film, but I sense intense anger and even hatred just below the surface.

The film tells the story of three people. Uncle (Jean-Marie Robain), Niece (Nicole Stephane), and Werner von Ebrennac (Howard Vernon). Uncle and Niece live quiet lives in the early days of the Second World War in a German occupied French town. One day, two German troops arrive with boxes for their lieutenant, Ebrennac, who is going to stay in their upper room. The film is a one-way dialogue between Ebrennac, who comes down to the sitting room every night to speak to his two landlords. He speaks of his love of France, stemming from his father's experiences during World War I, of his love of French literature, of his affection for French winters. He holds up French literature to a great extent, listing the great French writers off the top of his head and struggling to find similar numbers from other cultures, even his own. Germany, though, has the superior musicians.

What Ebrennac sees the war as is a melding of two great cultures. This manifests in a simmering affection he has for Niece. She's a reasonably attractive woman, and he looks at her like something of a conquest, though he never even tries to get her to respond to anything he says. He never touches her. He never proposes anything directly to her. It seems as though he finds their union inevitable, and he has no need to push things. They will naturally come together in time.

Through all of this, neither Uncle nor Niece says a thing to him. The film is narrated by Uncle, who explains little details, gives the specifics of his inner life, and helps fill in the picture of his steadily growing admiration for this German officer. Ebrennac is on a charm offensive, and it works. He stops wearing his military uniform in front of them, going up the back stairs when he comes back from his daily duties, changing into civilian clothes, and coming down the front stairs into the sitting room to speak for a few minutes on the wonders of France before retreating back to his own room. The internal monologue by Uncle is almost all we know of the steadily eroding wall between them except for one scene where Ebrennac plays the piano, and, with Ebrennac's back turned, Uncle and Niece watch on.

Ebrennac gets sent to Paris to visit one of his school friends who has risen faster and higher in the German command structure, and he's thrilled. He gets to go to the cultural center of France, to view the monuments and art of a culture he has long held in high regard, but the visit turns bad. Ebrennac's delusions of a post-war order where France and Germany are held up equally are dashed by the truth, told to him by his friend and other German officers, that any word of equity between the two cultures is a lie, that the goal is to oppress the people and suppress the culture of France in favor of Germany.

When he returns, he is crestfallen and admits everything to Uncle and Niece before telling them that he has put in a transfer to fight at the front. It is his sadness and resolve to no longer participate in the lie that finally breaks down the barriers with Uncle verbally allowing him into the room for the first time and Niece saying goodbye, the first word out of her mouth the entire film.

The quietness of the film is what gives it its power, I think. It's mostly set in a single room, but it never feels confined, breaking away for views of the outside of the small town and of Paris, and that concentrated view in the room creates a microcosm of the fight over hearts and minds of the French people. When the film started, I thought it was going to be a film about how there were no good Germans. Ebrennac is a man, though. A genuine man with real affection for France who was as lied to as the French people were. His inherent love of France that never falters is what bridges the divide between him and Uncle and Niece, and his inability to maintain the lie anymore, to throw himself into the meat grinder of war instead of keeping up the fiction, is what makes them finally see him as human.

There's great anger in this film, but there's also sadness. It's an intensely nationalistic film, all but waving the French blue, white, and red while screaming La Marseilles at the top of its lungs. The defense of France, its land, its villages, its cities, its culture, is what animates the film's subtext, and the idea of squashing it becomes the emotional core of the film. The idea that Melville's French identity was being intentionally wiped out angered him. When the Allies defeated Germany, Melville used his first film to express his rage at the effort, and it's all the more impressive because the film is so quiet and small and effective all at once.

This is a very good introduction to the cinematic world for Melville.