Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.
This is my third review of films directed by Bertrand Tavernier. I've yet to be disappointed by his work, though, admittedly, I've gone for the cream of his crop thus far. Life and Nothing But (1990) is a top-notch antiwar epic combined with a nicely developed romantic intrigue.
Historical Background: Bertrand Tavernier was born April 25th, 1941. His father was a well-known poet and journalist. Tavernier studied law for a while but his passion for cinema was evident early on and he quit law school to become a writer for film magazines, including Cahiers du Cinéma, where he came into contact with other future directors of the New Wave. He then turned to working as a publicist for the film industry in 1964 and, later, as an assistant director. He also collaborated during this time period on some film scripts and directing some shorts. He scored a major international triumph with his debut film as a director, The Clockmaker (1973). That film was also the first collaboration between Tavernier and actor Philippe Noiret. Noiret and Tavernier later renewed their working relationship in such films as Coup de Torchon (1981) and the one under review here, Life and Nothing But (1990).
Tavernier's films typically focus on social and political themes. His scripts are intelligent and vary considerably in type. Though quintessentially French in his perspective, Tavernier acknowledges being influenced by American filmmaking visual techniques. One of Tavernier's gifts (very evident in Life and Nothing But) is an ability to balance epic themes with stories that are personal and intimate.
The Story:Life and Nothing But takes place in France during the immediate aftermath of World War I. France has suffered about one-and-a-half million casualties from the war and there were some 350,000 soldiers missing-in-action (MIAs), yet to be reconciled after the allied victory. As the film opens, distraught parents, wives, and lovers are searching frantically for their loved ones at the temporary hospitals as well as units processing unidentified corpses. Overseeing the entire process is a career officer, Major Dellaphane (Philippe Noiret), Director of the War Casualties Information Bureau. Dellaphane meticulously photographs corpses and amnesiacs and records dimensions and personal effects, trying to match up as many of the unidentified casualties with information from the grieving families. Dellaphane takes his job quite seriously – more so, it seems, than his superiors or the politicians, who would prefer to close the books as quickly as possible, glorify the dead through monuments, and select one of the unknown soldiers for internment under the Arc de Triumphe in Paris. Dellaphane finds the glorification of the carnage morally repugnant, while the bureaucrats are concerned mainly with keeping the body count as quiet as possible.
Two of the many people searching for loved ones or their remains are Irène de Courtil (Sabine Azéma) and Alice (Pascale Vignal). Irène is a wealthy Parisian in search of her missing husband. She arrives in an expensive chauffeured motorcar, decked out in furs and a veil. Irène is politically connected. Her father-in-law is a Senator with clout and one of those pushing for closure on the identification process, but also hypocritically demanding that Major Dellaphane provide special attention to the resolution of his son's status. Dellaphane, a man of principle, is quick to assure Irène that the search for her husband will receive precisely one 350,000th of his attention – no more or less than any of the other cases. Irène is put out by the bureaucratic runaround she's been getting, traveling from one hospital to another and even being sent to one former temporary hospital, at a chateau, now shut down for over a week. So the two are at immediate loggerheads, though Dellaphane can't help also being impressed by Irène's aristocratic beauty and feisty determination.
Alice, by contrast, is a simple schoolteacher at a local school. At least she is as the film opens. She soon loses her job because the former teacher has just returned after discharge from the army. Alice has to take a temporary job at a restaurant. She doesn't want to leave the area because she, too, is searching – for her fiancé. Alice meets Irène for the first time when the former delivers tea to the latter in her car outside the restaurant.
Dellaphane is supervising the difficult removal of bodies from a troop and munitions train that had blown up inside a tunnel booby trapped by the Germans before their retreat. The task is complicated by the presence of poison gases, undetonated munitions, and the partial collapse of the tunnel. Dozens of families have gathered to examine personal effects and, if necessary, remains. One couple identifies some personal belongings of their nephew and is led into the tunnel to examine the remains. They comment gruesomely about how thin he looks and how his hair and nails have continued to grow. The poor corporal who has escorted them into the tunnel faints and the uncle has to carry him out. There is significant likelihood that Irène's husband and Alice's financé might be among those killed on that train. An explosion suddenly rocks the tunnel and Irène can't help but notice Dellaphane's courage in rescuing trapped workers and the resolve with which he performs his job in general. Dellaphane also takes steps to ease Irène's situation and provide her some comforts.
After the explosion in the tunnel, the families have to be put up for the night in a makeshift "hotel" in a closed-down munitions factory. Ironically, the factory is one owned by Irène's father-in-law. Dellaphane points out to Irène how the factory remains in perfect condition, while nearly every other building in the vicinity clearly shows the ravages of the long war. Irène's father-in-law, it seems, had struck a deal with the Germans, leaving the factory intact for their use as they were invading in exchange for the Germans leaving it intact when they later retreated. Apparently part of her father-in-law's reason for wanting the MIA process completed expeditiously is to reopen his factory as quickly as possible. Later, Dellaphane loses his cool when he overhears Irène chatting on the factory telephone with someone whom she calls "Pony." Dellaphane assumes that it must be her lover and jealously and rudely interrupts the conversation. Though Dellaphane is a gentleman and idealistic in performance of his job, he can also be boorish and temperamental at times. Later, Irène offers Alice a share of her sleeping quarters, since the two have developed a kind of bond through the commonality of their searches.
The rest of the plot needs to be left for readers to discover for themselves. The relationship between Dellaphane and Irène ultimately resolves itself in a creative and meaningful, if ambiguous, manner and Tavernier also works in a clever and ironic twist in another facet of the plot. The dead are, of course, duly glorified, though Dellaphane and we understand full well that the only thing that really should matter is life and nothing but.
Themes: It was certainly courageous of Tavernier even to tackle such a gruesome and depressing topic – the counting of the dead in the aftermath of an horrendous war. Tavernier never exploits the topic for shock value, never once photographing remains or corpses. He treats the topic with the respect it deserves but without the all too frequent glorification for political purposes that the dead so pointedly do not deserve to suffer. Tavernier deplores the reduction of so many lives to mere statistics and, worse, the effort to suppress even the statistics. It is the failing of the politicians, in the various countries that engaged in the war, which brought about the loss of so many young men, but the same politicians will now dishonor these same youth even in death. Dellaphane refers derisively to a quotation he had come across in a newspaper in which a General states, "The war's devastating allure only appears to be destructive." We also observe some individuals profiteering off the business of glorification, from the artists who design and make the monuments (one for every village) to the "investigators" who offer their services to grieving families. At one point in the film, two representatives arrive from one small village to complain to Dellaphane that none of the fourteen young men they had sent off to war had been killed and they are thus not eligible for a monument. They want the town's boundaries redrawn to include a farm where the family lost both a son and a worker.
Life and Nothing But delivers one of the strongest antiwar messages you'll ever experience without a single frame depicting war itself. Near the end of the film, Major Dellaphane writes, "These are my final dreadful statistics. In comparison to the duration of the Allied Victory March down the Champs-Elysées, about three hours I think, I calculated that given the same speed, step, and military formations, the march of those who died in this inexpiable madness would have lasted eleven days and eleven nights. Forgive me this crushing accuracy."
Production Values: Tavernier was at the height of his career when he made this film and his command of his craft clearly shows. The powerful message is balanced but not diluted by the engaging and intimate story of developing love and respect between Irène and Major Dellaphane. The three principal characters are nicely developed for the viewer, step by step. The film begins with three loosely interweaving threads, which then gradually collapse together into one poignant drama.
The period ambiance is outstanding, with vintage sets, trains, props, and costumes. The film was shot in Cinemascope, which the DVD presents in widescreen format, with an aspect ratio of 2.35:1. The quality of the digital transfer is excellent. The color palette for this film consists mainly of subdued, earthy hues. There are many visually appealing shots interspersed with the necessarily repulsive ones required by the subject matter. The soundtrack, by Oswald d"Andrea, featuring strings, is especially moody and effective.
Philippe Noiret is a unique kind of actor. I very much admire his work but it seems evident to me that he is not every viewer's cup of tea. Although I'm giving this film a five-star rating based on my own experience with it, I should advice readers that three of the seven reviews I encountered in my preparation were rather negative. The negative reviews focused mainly on perceptions that the film is slow and not emotionally engaging. I and other reviewers who praise the film found it powerful and very well crafted. I think that it is Noiret's hangdog visage and his sometimes lethargic demeanor that gets in the way for some viewers. I personally found his performance powerful and complex. So too did some others, apparently, since Noiret was awarded the Cesar for Best Actor for his performance in this film. Noiret’s resume also includes Topaz (1969), The Clockmaker (1973), Coup de Torchon (1981), Cinema Paradiso (1988), and Il Postino (1994).
This was the first time I've seen Sabine Azéma and, frankly, I'm very impressed. I can't wait to see her again! Fortunately, I won't have to wait long, since I'll soon be watching and reviewing another one of her films, A Sunday in the Country (1984). She's also appeared in Life is a Bed of Roses (1983) and Melo (1986) (which is a very difficult film to locate in America these days). In her role as Irène, Azéma radiates a striking combination of fierce feminine determination and sexuality. I thought her performance even better than Noiret's. During one dramatic moment in the film, Irène complains about the soldiers in a club suddenly breaking into song when the club's performers strike up a patriotic number, despite the fact that these same men had spent most of the day burying their dead. She then complains about the exclusion of women from these clubs. "Nothing scares you more than women, their wombs, their courage, their watching eyes." That is a line that few actresses other than Azéma could deliver without causing a snicker in the audience but Azéma demands respect and admiration.
Bottom-Line: The extras on the Kino Video DVD include a very interesting twenty-eight minute interview with Tavernier and Noiret as well as a gallery of stills and filmographies. The English subtitles are the optional variety. Life and Nothing But has a running time of 135 minutes. This is a beautifully textured film, but it's more theme than plot. The love story is moving but subsidiary to the powerful antiwar message. Those courting mainly entertainment from their film-viewing experiences might look elsewhere, but for the right audience, this film can be highly rewarding.
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