Resistance

2003
5.4| 1h32m| R| en
Details

The epic tale of an American reconnaissance pilot downed in occupied Belgium at the height of World War II. Hidden by resistance fighters, the pilot falls in love with the wife of the man who will save him. When their affair is exposed, an act of betrayal threatens their lives and the entire resistance movement, forcing the pilot to make a powerful choice that could change the course of the war.

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Reviews

Exoticalot People are voting emotionally.
Actuakers One of my all time favorites.
Rosie Searle It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.
Bob This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.
Marc Stynen (mstynen) This movie is not so bad. There are a few weak points in the plot (the date in another town, the fact the resistance turns him over to the Nazis in the end) but the acting is actually very good. The cinematography and music is also a feast for eyes and ears. It seems like the movie got cut in some scenes though to shorten the length of the movie (it's quite short - 88 minutes now). There's a scene in the trailer where the pilot is beating up a German soldier that was not in the movie, but blink and you'll miss it in the trailer. This is not a movie you will remember for a long time, but there are worse ways to spend 88 minutes. It does not deserve to be the financial flop as this movie turned out to be.
Claudio Carvalho On 16 January 1944, a reconnaissance American pilot survives a plane crash in Delahaut in the Nazi occupied Belgium. The boy Jean Benoit (Antoine Van Lierde) finds the wounded pilot and brings him to the house of Claire (Julia Ormond) and Henri Daussois (Philippe Volter) that belong to the Maquis Resistance. Sooner the Major Theodore 'Ted' Brice (Bill Paxton) is recovered and tells that he needs to retrieve a book of codes, but the airplane is guarded by the Nazis. Meanwhile Ted and Claire fall in love with each other. When three German guards that are protecting the debris of the airplane are executed, the Nazis select a group of villagers and hang them in a barn. When Henri finds that Ted and Claire are having a love affair, he betrays the pilot with tragic consequences."Resistance" is a nice romance with the gorgeous Julia Ormond and Bill Paxton showing a great chemistry but unfortunately in an unrealistic environment. The crush of Ted and Claire is acceptable since her marriage is ended but the situation of the couple dating in France is awfully silly and the betrayal of Henri is ridiculous and incoherent for a member of the resistance. My vote is six.Title (Brazil): "Amor e Guerra" ("Love and War")
charlytully That is how young Jean Benoit (portrayed by Antoine Van Lierde) describes the victims of a mass retaliation public hanging conducted by the Nazis after his grocery clerk friend Lucette Oomlop (Sandrine Bonnaire) has machined-gunned three German guards at the wreckage of Maj. Ted Brice's (Bill Paxton) B-24 reconnaissance plane late one night to recover a notebook Ted apparently left behind in his eagerness to scope out the local females. (Too bad he did not heed the message of the Andrews Sisters tune playing on the soundtrack, "Straighten up and fly right!") The tag lines for this maudlin war flick are "an act of courage will decide their destinies" and "an epic tale of courage, passion, and sacrifice." As in Ted seduces his married Resistance hostess Claire Daussois (Julia Ormond), and then drives her all over Belgium sampling the local night life instead of hiding in the barn as he's been told, single-handedly breaking up the cell of resisters who are trying to save him and help the Allies prepare for D-Day? After viewing the movie, people will be shaking their heads "uh-huh" and longing for something as "realistic" as Michael Bay's Affleck-Beckinsale-Hartnett 2001 tear-jerker, PEARL HARBOR. How did writer-director Todd Komarnicki pitch this mess to the studio RESISTANCE bankrupted: THE GREAT ESCAPE meets DIRTY DANCING? Three years after this fiasco, Paul Verhoeven's ZWARTBOEK (THE BLACK BOOK) covered much of this same ground with more authenticity, more drama, and better production values all around. Do yourself a favor and rent that; RESISTANCE should be left dancing in the wind.
bandw This story of Ted Brice, an American pilot who is the sole survivor of the crash of an Allied reconnaissance plane in Belgium in January of 1944, is pretty much of a mess. The title would lead you to think that it is principally a story about the Belgian armed resistance groups, but that seems to be just a backdrop to prop up a silly love story between Ted and Claire, the woman who takes Ted in. Claire's husband Henri is a committed resistance member, but it is Claire who decides, in Henri's absence and against his wishes, to give Ted refuge.Crucial plot details don't make sense. Central to the story is the retrieval of the recorder on the downed plane that contains navigation codes and the positions of targets. But in the opening scene we see Belgians looting the plane, resistance members among them. Why did they not retrieve the valued items at that time instead of waiting for the Nazis to come and guard the plane? And the whole affair of transferring Ted out of the area was conducted using secret instructions and code words when the transaction could have just been a simple exchange. The ponderous music attempts, but fails, to lend some weight to this tepid undertaking.The most ludicrous part of the movie is how the love affair develops between Ted and Claire. At first Claire is devoted to nursing Ted back from near death and, when Ted starts to recover, they become physically involved (while Henri is conveniently away conducting resistance business). Julie Ormond does a passable job as Claire, but she effects a French accent that I frequently found impossible to understand. Her responses seemed a little weak at times - when informed of the hanging deaths of several town members she reacts as though she had just been told that the local grocery was out of peaches. As Ted, Bill Paxton seems just to be reciting his lines; his performance is so uninspired that it's embarrassing. A true American pilot might evidence such a flat personality, but it does not make for convincing cinema. I did not sense any chemistry between these supposed lovers.The most idiotic thing is the way that Ted and Claire act like lovers on holiday. Maybe sexual release from such heavy situations is understandable, but to appear totally oblivious of the gravity of the situation is hard to fathom. At first Ted is consigned to an attic room and Claire worries about his even coming into the house. But as things develop he not only comes into the house, he dances with Claire to loud music, enters the adjoining barn to have a game of baseball with a local boy, and ultimately goes on a car trip with Claire to a nearby town.The young boy seems to be most committed to his role, but he is undermined by the script. He has an uncanny ability to be at crucial events without being noticed. And when he delivers lines like:"Have you ever seen someone get hanged. They look like the're dancing, but they can't find the floor." you feel that it is the screenwriter talking and not a thirteen year old boy.And oh, by the way, there are scenes to show that the Nazis are pretty bad guys.Comparing this film to the brilliant "Ashes and Diamonds" about the Polish resistance, or the equally stellar "Lacombe, Lucien" about the French resistance, one realizes what a truly dismal affair it is.

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