Officer's Ward
(2001)
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THE OFFICER'S WARD, a masterful adaptation by director Francois Dupeyron of the novel by Marc Dugain, is set in Paris during World War I. Adrien (Eric Caravaca) is a youthful engineer with his whole life ahead of him who waits anxiously for the war to begin. He watches soldiers leaving on trains for the front line, and is smitten with a young woman, Clemence (Geraldine Pailhas), with whom he passes one tender, desperate night. Soon after, while on patrol, a bomb lands just next to him, knocking him unconscious. When he awakes, he realizes that he cannot speak, though he can move his arms and legs. The only injury he has suffered is to his mouth and one side of his face. For an entire 35 minutes after this tragic event, Adrien's face is not shown. He is placed in a specialized ward for officers with facial disfigurements, and every nurse and doctor that looks at him cringes in astonishment. It is not until Adrien dares to confront himself by looking at his reflection in the glass of the window that the viewer sees the horrific condition of his face. The other men in the ward support and encourage each other, helping each other to endure what was once unimaginable. A sweet and nurturing nurse, Anais (Sabine Azema), offers Adrien motherly compassion, but he worries that no woman will ever look at him again the way that Clemence once did. Through masterful filming, moving performances by each and every cast member, and a beautiful, artistic script, THE OFFICER'S WARD makes a monumental statement both about the horrors of war and the resiliency of the human spirit. |
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Adapted from the novel by Marc Dugain, this is a sensitive yet unflinching examination of human indomitability. At the outset of the First World War, Eric Caravaca is hideously disfigured by a bomb blast to the face and spends the rest of the war in a Parisian hospital where he undergoes painful and primitive reconstructive surgery. The extent of Caravaca's disfigurement is not revealed for nearly an hour, so the reaction he elicits on the faces of the hospital staff is our only source for the severity of his plight. By refusing to capitalise on the visual horror of the officers' injuries, director François Dupeyron lends dignity to both their determination and despair, and thus ensures more than knee-jerk pity from the audience. Moreover, it enables those caring for the soldiers — including the ever-cheerful surgeon André Dussolier and maternal nurse Sabine Azéma — to share in their quiet courage. Though unnecessarily trite in its optimistic resolution, this is both an affecting condemnation of warfare and a powerful tribute to the human spirit.