"Captain Conan (Capitaine Conan)' ***1/2. (1996, France, Not Rated, 129 min Directed Bertrand Tavernier with Philippe Torreton, Samuel Lebihan, Bernard Le Coq). History on the cusp of any war is most often overlooked. How many of us have or take the opportunity to study or learn about the United States during the 1760s or 1870s? When did you last read about Europe in 1900, 1920, 1932 or 1946? `Capitaine Conan' is a movie about men on the cusp, at the end of World War I. For this alone, `Capitaine Conan' is a movie worth seeing. For more than a year after the Armistice, over 100,000 French troops fought in Eastern Europe.
`Capitaine Conan' opens on the battlefront in Bulgaria. Conan (Torreton) is the leader of a guerrilla troop that fights behind enemy lines. They live off the land, fighting where the rules of engagement are brutally one on one. Conan tells his friend Norbett (Lebihan) ` 3000 men like me won the war. Anyone can kill at a distance, but only a few learn to kill with the knife, eye to eye. It took all the millions of soldiers like you to fight the war, but it took the few like myself to win it.' But when the Armistice is announced Conan's men are thrust back into the civilized world, a world of army regulations, boredom, and restrictions. Conan's guerrillas aren't easily tamed. There's a robbery and murder at the nightclub. Conan's men are the primary suspects. But before there is any resolution in the military court, the French troops are called to fight the Bolsheviks on the border of the newly formed Soviet Union. The Bolsheviks attack the French and Conan leads his men into the battle. As the scene fades they are running into the reeds and rushes of a huge river delta.
The movie ends with Conan and Norbett meeting some years later. Conan is dying. Their discussion is unsettling and doesn't resolve any of the unanswered questions about how the war ended. I've watched the movie twice and the ending still seems out of place. But then maybe wars and history don't end. Maybe history is a continuum and life on the cusp between events is more difficult to define and understand than the events themselves. Maybe this is why most history is about events and less so about the life and lives around the events.
If you're put of by the thought that `Capitaine Conan' is nothing more than a history lesson, be not afraid. The acting, direction, and photography are very well done. One of the most interesting features of this production is the hand held camera work during the battle scenes. The camera moves through the battle like another pair of eyes often distracted by an explosion, an obstruction or a scream. The camera flinches as it makes its way though the mud and the muck of the battle. The staging of a battle in the hills of Bulgaria is up to the standards of the battle scenes in `Patton.'
`Capitaine Conan' is a very good movie, one of the best of 1996. It's out on video, I recommend you see it.
`Capitaine Conan' opens on the battlefront in Bulgaria. Conan (Torreton) is the leader of a guerrilla troop that fights behind enemy lines. They live off the land, fighting where the rules of engagement are brutally one on one. Conan tells his friend Norbett (Lebihan) ` 3000 men like me won the war. Anyone can kill at a distance, but only a few learn to kill with the knife, eye to eye. It took all the millions of soldiers like you to fight the war, but it took the few like myself to win it.' But when the Armistice is announced Conan's men are thrust back into the civilized world, a world of army regulations, boredom, and restrictions. Conan's guerrillas aren't easily tamed. There's a robbery and murder at the nightclub. Conan's men are the primary suspects. But before there is any resolution in the military court, the French troops are called to fight the Bolsheviks on the border of the newly formed Soviet Union. The Bolsheviks attack the French and Conan leads his men into the battle. As the scene fades they are running into the reeds and rushes of a huge river delta.
The movie ends with Conan and Norbett meeting some years later. Conan is dying. Their discussion is unsettling and doesn't resolve any of the unanswered questions about how the war ended. I've watched the movie twice and the ending still seems out of place. But then maybe wars and history don't end. Maybe history is a continuum and life on the cusp between events is more difficult to define and understand than the events themselves. Maybe this is why most history is about events and less so about the life and lives around the events.
If you're put of by the thought that `Capitaine Conan' is nothing more than a history lesson, be not afraid. The acting, direction, and photography are very well done. One of the most interesting features of this production is the hand held camera work during the battle scenes. The camera moves through the battle like another pair of eyes often distracted by an explosion, an obstruction or a scream. The camera flinches as it makes its way though the mud and the muck of the battle. The staging of a battle in the hills of Bulgaria is up to the standards of the battle scenes in `Patton.'
`Capitaine Conan' is a very good movie, one of the best of 1996. It's out on video, I recommend you see it.