The Army of Shadows

“Unhappy memories! Yet I welcome you… you are my long-lost youth.…” It is with this epigram, referring to his service in the French Resistance, that Jean-Pierre Melville opens the most personal, and perhaps even greatest, of his films. The protagonists are members of an anti-Nazi underground cell and most events take place within this closed, anxious group, against the background of the Gestapo threat. There are no grandiose heroic stories here, but rather, the men’s struggle to survive and the complex relationships they develop. Melville employs his signature style – rhythmic and enrapturing, whilst remaining ascetic, calculated, and precise. Featuring French stars, Lino Ventura and Simone Signoret.