Event

La France

One of the most genuinely peculiar movies to emerge in many a moon, La France is a bizarre but beautiful brew, equal parts genderbending drama, warfilm, romantic odyssey, and anachronistic folkmusical. Determined to find her husband who has vanished into the storm of WWI, Camille (Sylvie Testud) disguises herself as a man and sets off into the countryside, where she soon falls in with a band of wandering soldiers who are burdened with a secret of their own. Eschewing realism for an allegorical, fablelike tone, La France is noteperfect, a soulful, mysterious, and poetic voyage through a landscape that is both wartorn and enchanted. Like the songs that punctuate the narrative, La France is melancholy, strange and lovely.

Without ever surrendering its deadpan naturalism, La France becomes increasingly poetic: The seasons change, the landscape grows barren, and the stars in the sky take their names from the dead men below. J. Hoberman, Village Voice