The Sorrow and the Pity

Turner Classic Movies will feature the world television premiere of Marcel Ophuls' newly restored two-part World War II documentary, THE SORROW AND THE PITY (1971), on Wednesday, June 6 at 8 p.m. (ET). Presented by Woody Allen, the restored version of the Academy Award¿-nominated documentary and winner of the National Society of Film Critics Special Award features English subtitles for the first time. This widely acclaimed made-for-French-television documentary looks at the Nazi occupation of France from various perspectives and was the first film to demystify the prevailing myth that France's citizens nobly resisted. Examining the complex issues of collaboration and resistance, this film gives a clear and powerful portrait of how real people behaved in the face of extraordinary circumstances. Ophuls illustrates the differing points of view and varied memories of France's reaction to the Nazi occupation through the use of newsreel footage and a variety of individual memories comprised of factual accounts, perception of events and propaganda. Turning his camera on a single French town - Clermont-Ferrand - Ophuls interviewed those residents who not only remembered the war but also would speak candidly about what took place. He also gathered government officials from France, Germany and England as well as German veterans and journalists/writers who discussed how the French and Germans lived together. His subjects talk openly about how the French supposedly cooperated with the Nazis and how each of them felt about the perception of France being the only country in Europe to collaborate with Germany from 1940 to 1944. The first half of the film, entitled "The Collapse," presents archival footage with 1969 interviews of a German officer, French collaborators and French resistance fighters. Those interviewed give unique perspectives on the nature and details of the collaboration as well as the reasons for it, ranging from anti-Semitism to xenophobia and the fear of the Bolsheviks' power to simple caution. Ophuls manages to explore the varying perceptions of his subjects and the sometimes-dramatic contrasts between their memories. The end result is the irony that emerges from these varying testimonies set against newsreels and propaganda films. (Ophuls is available for interviews.) At the heart of part two, "The Choice," is an interview with Christian de la Maziere, one of 7,000 French youth to fight on France's eastern front, wearing German uniforms. Ophuls' interpretation of history as the "process of recollection, in things like choice, selective memory and rationalization" is fully illustrated and the second half of the film is devoted almost entirely to interviews, in which the subjects display emotions ranging from mild embarrassment to intense anger. It also examines how large and effective the Resistance Movement was, whether the French actually surrendered or collaborated with the Germans and questions the impact the occupation of the troops had on the lives of the French citizens.

Marcel Ophuls' The Sorrow and the Pity (1971) is an absorbing portrait of the complexities of survival, resistance or capitulation in Nazi-occupied France during the Second World War. This newly restored film features exhaustive interviews with enough intriguing figures to fill a dozen spy novels. Just a few of the ordinary and famous subjects who document their experience of the war for Ophuls are Churchill's Foreign Secretary, Sir Anthony Eden, working-class resistance fighters, a German soldier Helmut Tausend, stationed in France during the war, an aristocratic French Nazi, a British spy in France who worked undercover as a transvestite cabaret performer and entertainer Maurice Chevalier, who defends himself against charges of sympathizing with the Germans. Ophuls' four-hour plus documentary is set in and around the French provincial town of Clemont-Ferrand where the director challenges the notion that all of France resisted the Nazi invasion of their country. Divided into two parts, Ophuls' documentary unfolds slowly, and the pace reveals an intentional strategy of gradually acclimating viewers to how a citizenry could allow their moral values to be compromised for the sake of personal gain or survival. One subtle message of Ophuls' film is how often the bourgeois collaborated with the Germans for wealth or to retain their status, and how it was often the humble peasants and farmers who exhibited the most patriotic and self-sacrificing behavior during the Occupation. Subjects attest to acts of extreme kindness and bravery shown by humble French farmers who sheltered British spies and of unfathomable barbarity, such as the Gestapo's vicious torture and murder of a Resistance Fighter's wife. But cruelty cuts both ways in France and is not limited to wartime atrocities. Even with liberation, the nation was again divided as suspected Nazi collaborators and even women who dated German soldiers were persecuted as enemies of the state. The Sorrow and the Pity was originally made for French television, though it was not aired until 1981; some claimed it was because of its troubling indictment of French behavior during the German occupation. The film also offers a glimpse at how perniciously and subtly a nation can be transformed from resistant to compliant through propaganda and intimidation. Ophuls unearthed rare films for The Sorrow and the Pity including German newsreels (originally seen only in enemy territory) and the viciously anti-Semitic Jew Suss (1940) which show the climate of hatred that the Germans stoked. But several of Ophuls' subjects also attest to a closeted anti-Semitism that already existed in France, which the German occupiers merely exploited. In one eerie moment from a newsreel of the anti-Semitic exhibition "The Jew and France," viewers can see the face of esteemed director Ernst Lubitsch used to illustrate how to "spot" a Jew. Ophuls' voice can be heard throughout the film, questioning his subjects and probing subtly, but effectively, ever deeper to reveal evasions and outright lies in the interviewees' statements. Ophuls saw the film as an examination of history as the "process of recollection, in things like choice, selective memory, rationalization." The only son of the esteemed German-Jewish director Max Ophuls (La Ronde, 1950) who immigrated to America in the 1940s, Marcel Ophuls returned to France after an education at Hollywood High, Occidental College and the University of California-Berkeley. After several narrative films made at the onset of his career (light comedies like Banana Peel (1963) and Make Your Bets, Ladies (1965), Ophuls did not achieve real fame until he made The Sorrow and the Pity, a three-year project that has come to define his directorial career. Ironically, Ophuls, whose name is forevermore linked to the documentary form, prefers making entertainment films. But after The Sorrow and the Pity, the film he is most remembered for is Hotel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie (1988), yet another epic WWII documentary concerned with a Nazi war criminal. It won an Oscar for best documentary feature. Director: Marcel Ophuls Producer: Andre Harris and Alain de Sedouy Screenplay: Andre Harris and Marcel Ophuls Cinematography: Andre Gazut and Jurgen Thieme Music: Maurice Chevalier Film Editing: Claude Vajda Appearances by: Georges Bidault, Matheus Bleibinger, Rene Bousquet (Himself (with Laval) archive footage, uncredited), Charles Braun, Maurice Buckmaster. Part 1, BW-122m. Letterboxed. Part 2, BW-129m. Letterboxed. by Felicia Feaster

Marcel Ophuls' The Sorrow and the Pity (1971) is an absorbing portrait of the complexities of survival, resistance or capitulation in Nazi-occupied France during the Second World War. This newly restored film features exhaustive interviews with enough intriguing figures to fill a dozen spy novels. Just a few of the ordinary and famous subjects who document their experience of the war for Ophuls are Churchill's Foreign Secretary, Sir Anthony Eden, working-class resistance fighters, a German soldier Helmut Tausend, stationed in France during the war, an aristocratic French Nazi, a British spy in France who worked undercover as a transvestite cabaret performer and entertainer Maurice Chevalier, who defends himself against charges of sympathizing with the Germans. Ophuls' four-hour plus documentary is set in and around the French provincial town of Clemont-Ferrand where the director challenges the notion that all of France resisted the Nazi invasion of their country. Divided into two parts, Ophuls' documentary unfolds slowly, and the pace reveals an intentional strategy of gradually acclimating viewers to how a citizenry could allow their moral values to be compromised for the sake of personal gain or survival. One subtle message of Ophuls' film is how often the bourgeois collaborated with the Germans for wealth or to retain their status, and how it was often the humble peasants and farmers who exhibited the most patriotic and self-sacrificing behavior during the Occupation. Subjects attest to acts of extreme kindness and bravery shown by humble French farmers who sheltered British spies and of unfathomable barbarity, such as the Gestapo's vicious torture and murder of a Resistance Fighter's wife. But cruelty cuts both ways in France and is not limited to wartime atrocities. Even with liberation, the nation was again divided as suspected Nazi collaborators and even women who dated German soldiers were persecuted as enemies of the state. The Sorrow and the Pity was originally made for French television, though it was not aired until 1981; some claimed it was because of its troubling indictment of French behavior during the German occupation. The film also offers a glimpse at how perniciously and subtly a nation can be transformed from resistant to compliant through propaganda and intimidation. Ophuls unearthed rare films for The Sorrow and the Pity including German newsreels (originally seen only in enemy territory) and the viciously anti-Semitic Jew Suss (1940) which show the climate of hatred that the Germans stoked. But several of Ophuls' subjects also attest to a closeted anti-Semitism that already existed in France, which the German occupiers merely exploited. In one eerie moment from a newsreel of the anti-Semitic exhibition "The Jew and France," viewers can see the face of esteemed director Ernst Lubitsch used to illustrate how to "spot" a Jew. Ophuls' voice can be heard throughout the film, questioning his subjects and probing subtly, but effectively, ever deeper to reveal evasions and outright lies in the interviewees' statements. Ophuls saw the film as an examination of history as the "process of recollection, in things like choice, selective memory, rationalization." The only son of the esteemed German-Jewish director Max Ophuls (La Ronde, 1950) who immigrated to America in the 1940s, Marcel Ophuls returned to France after an education at Hollywood High, Occidental College and the University of California-Berkeley. After several narrative films made at the onset of his career (light comedies like Banana Peel (1963) and Make Your Bets, Ladies (1965), Ophuls did not achieve real fame until he made The Sorrow and the Pity, a three-year project that has come to define his directorial career. Ironically, Ophuls, whose name is forevermore linked to the documentary form, prefers making entertainment films. But after The Sorrow and the Pity, the film he is most remembered for is Hotel Terminus: The Life and Times of Klaus Barbie (1988), yet another epic WWII documentary concerned with a Nazi war criminal. It won an Oscar for best documentary feature. Director: Marcel Ophuls Producer: Andre Harris and Alain de Sedouy Screenplay: Andre Harris and Marcel Ophuls Cinematography: Andre Gazut and Jurgen Thieme Music: Maurice Chevalier Film Editing: Claude Vajda Appearances by: Georges Bidault, Matheus Bleibinger, Rene Bousquet (Himself (with Laval) archive footage, uncredited), Charles Braun, Maurice Buckmaster. BW-251m. Letterboxed. By Felicia Feaste