Wasn't what I was expecting....
Spoilers ** Spoilers **Spoilers ** below
Performances were good all around. Keep your hand on the FF button, unless you want to see gratuitous groping and moaning (I don't). Nice period piece. Brad, a highly-ranked espionage agent in World War II, with a pilot background, gets hooked up with the Marian Cotillard character, pulling a dangerous coup in Morocco, and then escaping to safety in Britain, where they marry. As you're aware, allegations are made to Brad that his bride (and the mother of a new child) is, in fact, a spy, planted in Africa by the Germans, as a replacement for a legit French freedom fighter who was executed. Brad has reason to suspect his mettle is just being tested.
** Don't read below unless you've seen it **
Spoilers ** Spoilers **Spoilers ** and plot questions
1> why didn't Marianne change sides, once she got to Britain? Confess, and switch sides? The Gestapo had less assets than the Brits in England, if things went sour -- she could have been a great double-agent, passing bad info onto the Gestapo. lived happily ever after. when she finally owned up, she showed that she was a self-serving schemer. Sorry - it's a hard world. There are prices to pay for lying--and betrayal.
2> she (finally) gives herself away by not being able to play the piano like the real person. No decent Espionage outfit would commit an oversight like that. The Gestapo would have gotten her lessons up front, or, maybe on the sly in U.K. once she settled there, in case the subject ever came up. With 3 weeks practice, I could play La Marseillaise convincingly. It ain't a recital at Albert Hall.
Apart from that, I am impressed that the production team didn't script a typical clichéd happy ending. Even if she goes for option 1 above, you could still deliver a tragic conclusion by having a German agent finally 'get to her' (lethally). It's just that her character didn't strike me as a German patriot - hence, I can't buy that she would jeopardize her new life, just to pass low grade info to the Axis side, which, by 1944, was obviously going to lose anyway.
Performances were good all around. Keep your hand on the FF button, unless you want to see gratuitous groping and moaning (I don't). Nice period piece. Brad, a highly-ranked espionage agent in World War II, with a pilot background, gets hooked up with the Marian Cotillard character, pulling a dangerous coup in Morocco, and then escaping to safety in Britain, where they marry. As you're aware, allegations are made to Brad that his bride (and the mother of a new child) is, in fact, a spy, planted in Africa by the Germans, as a replacement for a legit French freedom fighter who was executed. Brad has reason to suspect his mettle is just being tested.
** Don't read below unless you've seen it **
Spoilers ** Spoilers **Spoilers ** and plot questions
1> why didn't Marianne change sides, once she got to Britain? Confess, and switch sides? The Gestapo had less assets than the Brits in England, if things went sour -- she could have been a great double-agent, passing bad info onto the Gestapo. lived happily ever after. when she finally owned up, she showed that she was a self-serving schemer. Sorry - it's a hard world. There are prices to pay for lying--and betrayal.
2> she (finally) gives herself away by not being able to play the piano like the real person. No decent Espionage outfit would commit an oversight like that. The Gestapo would have gotten her lessons up front, or, maybe on the sly in U.K. once she settled there, in case the subject ever came up. With 3 weeks practice, I could play La Marseillaise convincingly. It ain't a recital at Albert Hall.
Apart from that, I am impressed that the production team didn't script a typical clichéd happy ending. Even if she goes for option 1 above, you could still deliver a tragic conclusion by having a German agent finally 'get to her' (lethally). It's just that her character didn't strike me as a German patriot - hence, I can't buy that she would jeopardize her new life, just to pass low grade info to the Axis side, which, by 1944, was obviously going to lose anyway.
- canuckteach
- Aug 20, 2017