Lacombe, Lucien
Short description
Set in rural France in 1944, Lacombe, Lucien follows a teenage peasant named Lucien who wants to join the Resistance. Turned away because of his youth, he drifts instead toward the German police, whose local contingent welcomes him. Given a position among collaborators, he takes to the authority it grants him, using it against a Jewish family even as he becomes drawn to their daughter, France. The arrangement grows increasingly precarious as his private feelings collide with the role he has chosen.
Louis Malle directed and co-wrote the screenplay with Patrick Modiano, and produced the film with Claude Nedjar. It is the seventh of the thirteen features Malle directed, arriving between Murmur of the Heart and Black Moon. Pierre Blaise plays Lucien, with Aurore Clément as France, Holger Löwenadler as Albert Horn, Therese Giehse as the grandmother, and Stéphane Bouy and Loumi Iacobesco in supporting roles. The film runs 138 minutes and was made as a co-production between France, Italy and Germany.
On IMDb the film holds a rating of 7.6 from around 8,300 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 7 from roughly 169 votes. Its critics' score is considerably higher, 9.2 from ten reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- Louis Malle (director, screenwriter, and producer) understood that the actor for the lead role had to be found among natives of the region where the film takes place, as only such an actor would have the necessary accent. Malle organized auditions, but the right actor remained elusive until Pierre Blez arrived. As it turned out, Blez did not enjoy the filming process, and a few days after production began, he informed the director that he had had enough and was going home. Malle and his assistants had to persuade Blez not to leave. Malle guessed what Blez disliked—he was only 17 years old and felt that everyone on set was bossing him around. Malle gathered the technical crew and informed everyone present that, starting Monday, they were to treat Blez 'as if he were Alain Delon or Jean-Paul Belmondo.'
- While preparing for the shoot, Louis Malle spent several months conducting research, interviewing former collaborators and members of the Resistance, and consulting with historians. During this period, Malle discovered that a man very similar to the future film's protagonist had actually existed. Moreover, it turned out that during World War II, this man had lived in an abandoned house belonging to the Malle family.
- Louis Malle (the film's director, screenwriter, and producer) worked on the script together with writer Patrick Modiano. Initially, they gave the project a different title and intended to film it in Mexico. However, Malle was not permitted to film in Mexico, just as he hadn't been in Chile, so he rewrote the script to set the action in France during World War II. The project was then given a title—again, a temporary one—referencing the paramilitary organization created by the Vichy regime to fight the Resistance.
Auditions in India
Casting calls in USA
Castingi w Polsce
Кастинги в Україні
