Sarah's Key

Sarah's Key is a French drama set in two time periods. In July 1942, ten-year-old Sarah is taken with her parents when Paris police round up thousands of Jewish families for deportation. Before the officers reach the apartment, she hides her younger brother in a cupboard, keeping the key. Sixty years later, Julia Jarmond, an American journalist who has lived in France for two decades, is asked to write about the Vel' d'Hiv roundup. Researching the archives, she finds Sarah's file and realizes her husband's family is connected to the girl's story, turning an assignment into something personal.

Gilles Paquet-Brenner directed and co-wrote the film with Serge Joncour, adapting Tatiana de Rosnay's novel. It followed his earlier features Payoff and Walled In and preceded Dark Places and Crooked House. Kristin Scott Thomas plays Julia, with Mélusine Mayance as the young Sarah, and Niels Arestrup, Frédéric Pierrot, Michel Duchaussoy and Dominique Frot among the supporting cast.

Made for about 10 million dollars, the film took roughly 18 million worldwide, a solid return for a French production of its scale. On IMDb it holds 7.5 from around 19,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.3 from a smaller base of 724. A critics' rating of 6.4 from 113 reviews sits below those audience scores.