The Last Metro
(1980)
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Francois Truffaut, whose DAY FOR NIGHT explored the world of filmmaking, now turns to the stage in this story of a small theatre company during the German occupation of France. Marion Steiner (Catherine Deneuve), the theatre's owner, is desperately trying to keep both the troupe and Lucas (Heinz Bennet), her Jewish husband, alive. To do this, she's staging a new play, which must be successful if she is to maintain the theater. Not only is this an artistic imperative--the building also serves as a refuge for Lucas, who's hiding from the Nazis. But just as the actors begin their rehearsals, an anti-Semitic journalist ensconces himself in the theater, creating an atmosphere of fear and insecurity. Will he discover Lucas's hideaway...or the truth about the political affiliations of Bernard (Gerard Depardieu), the group's lead actor. |
Considering he'd always wanted to make a film about the Occupation, François Truffaut largely ignores its hideous realities in this nostalgic tribute to the theatre. In essence, this is a backstage equivalent of Day for Night, with the Nazi threat replacing the impatience of the moneymen. The dynamic between the members of Jewish manager Heinz Bennent's company is well sustained, as is the mystery of whether Bennent's wife Catherine Deneuve prefers him to actor/Resistance fighter Gérard Depardieu. But the life of this enclosed ensemble is too divorced from history to make the movie anything more than just a handsomely mounted, meticulously performed fantasy.
Halliwell's Film Guide
Tightly enclosed symbolic melodrama of oppression and release that concentrates on individual lives caught up in a moment of mass madness and seeking refuge in their dedication to their art.