Word: lucien
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...seen south of the Arctic Circle, and never before in the continental U.S. It was indeed present and, as if on cue, put on a show for the hundreds of bird watchers by feeding three times each day with a flock of Bonaparte's gulls (named after Charles Lucien Bonaparte, an ornithologist and a nephew of Napoleon) making their accustomed annual visit...
Although not all French films are about childhood, in times like these most appear to be. Many, recently, have also concerned the German occupation during World War II. Louis Malle's Lacombe, Lucien (TIME, Oct. 14) is the most prominent among them: a steady, serious film, and vastly better than Les Violons du Bal. Both movies are about the humiliation and extermination of Jews, related through the experiences of a youthful protagonist. But all that was thoughtful in Malle's movie becomes smarmy in Les Violons du Bal-politics crushed into pastels for a Sunday painter...
...wrecks some of this, allows some of it to happen. Lucien would probably never have become an outlaw if it hadn't been for the war. Malle focuses not on great events themselves but on how great events enter and overpower the lives of individuals. We can never be completely sure about Lucien--Malle doesn't tell us quite enough about him and the society around him for us to be sure in our judgment...
...seems as if the most important thing about Lucien's death is its social context. We shouldn't so much be concerned with judging the rights and wrongs of his actions, but with removing his motivations. It is the social injustice Lucien confronts that must be remembered--and corrected--if we don't wish to have to shoot Lucien again, or, next time around, be shot...
...Lacombe, Lucien is playing at the Charles West Cinema...