In Louis Malle's lauded drama, Lucien Lacombe is a young man living in rural France during World War II who seeks to join the French Resistance. When he is rejected due to his youth, the resentful Lucien allies himself with the Nazis and joins the Gallic arm of their Gestapo. Lucien grows to enjoy the power that comes with his position, but his life is complicated when he falls for France Horn, a beautiful young Jewish woman.
Ratings
Curator score: 7.5/10
IMDb: 7.6/10
Letterboxd: 3.81/5
Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
TMDB: 7.0/10
Director
Louis Malle
Production
Hallelujah-Film GmbH, Vides Cinematografica, Nouvelles Éditions de Films
Cast
Pierre Blaise, Aurore Clément, Holger Löwenadler, Therese Giehse, Stéphane Bouy, Loumi Iacobesco, René Bouloc, Jean Rougerie, Pierre Decazes, Jacqueline Staup, Cécile Ricard, Ave Ninchi, Pierre Saintons, Jacques Rispal, Gilberte Rivet, Jean Bousquet, Franz Rudnick, Jean-Louis Blum, Claude Marcan, Jean Maurat
Curator Review
Verdict
A morally thorny, unsentimental World War II drama that studies how boredom, resentment, and opportunism can slide into collaboration. It’s less a resistance thriller than a chilling portrait of a boy becoming dangerous, with Louis Malle refusing easy heroism or tidy psychology.
Best for
viewers who like ambiguous antiheroes and moral psychology
fans of austere European war dramas
people interested in occupation-era France and collaboration
viewers who prefer character study over action
Skip if
you want a conventional Resistance adventure
you need clear-cut heroes and villains
you’re sensitive to animal cruelty on screen
you prefer fast-paced wartime plotting
Overview
Louis Malle turns a wartime premise into something colder and more unsettling than a standard resistance drama. Rather than building toward patriotic uplift, the film watches a restless rural teenager drift toward power, cruelty, and self-justification. That refusal to moralize too neatly is exactly what makes it linger.
Worth noting
Pierre Blaise’s performance gives Lucien a blank, almost frightening openness: he is not a grand ideologue so much as a boy who discovers that authority feels good. Malle keeps the film grounded in lived-in detail and social texture, so the occupation feels banal before it feels catastrophic.
Bottom line
What emerges is a portrait of fascism as opportunism, immaturity, and appetite, not just ideology. It’s a tough, intelligent film that earns admiration through its precision and its willingness to make the audience sit with discomfort.
Top Letterboxd reviews
pirateneckbeard (4★) · 217 likes
What a fascinating movie in how it moves and is to be interrupted. It's like a smoke caught in a bubble cause as much as it's a simplistic narrative, it has grooves that make you needle at and don't give you a simple answer.
Take for instance our non-actor lead Pierre Blaise(Lucien) who has a swagger and look of a young John Garfield and even encapsulates his gangster persona but what Louis Malle peppers in is this cold disposition full… more What a fascinating movie in how it moves and is to be interrupted. It's like a smoke caught in a bubble cause as much as it's a simplistic narrative, it has grooves that make you needle at and don't give you a simple answer.
Take for instance our non-actor lead Pierre Blaise(Lucien) who has a swagger and look of a young John Garfield and even encapsulates his gangster persona but what Louis Malle peppers in is this cold disposition full… more
shookone (5★) · 142 likes
tough take 1: this is the spiritual brother of Salò, or the 100 Days of Sodom
tougher take 2: how is this not in the canon of the 50 most important films (min. of europe / the 2oth century)?
Lucien kills 3 different animals brutally in the first 10 minutes of the film and should you wonder if you’re supposed to feel anything for this fucker you don't have to look back further than right to the starting point. it’s… more
chavel (4★) · 109 likes
One of the two or three 1970’s World War II films that’s worth a damn (most of the time that decade they got WWII wrong). Disaffected 17-year old Lucien Lacombe (Pierre Blaise) toils as a farmhand or mops an old folk’s ward, the second job is where he obviously doesn’t care about old people. Based on his age, he is denied acceptance to join the French Resistance when word is German occupancy is coming to occupy his southwest France countryside… more One of the two or three 1970’s World War II films that’s worth a damn (most of the time that decade they got WWII wrong). Disaffected 17-year old Lucien Lacombe (Pierre Blaise) toils as a farmhand or mops an old folk’s ward, the second job is where he obviously doesn’t care about old people. Based on his age, he is denied acceptance to join the French Resistance when word is German occupancy is coming to occupy his southwest France countryside… more
Slig001 (3★) · 99 likes
A World War 2 set French Resistance film with a difference. Lacombe, Lucien takes place in rural France and focuses on Lucien Lacombe, a young man with an obvious mean streak. We are introduced to him in a scene that sees him needlessly kill a bird with a slingshot. He tries to join the French Resistance but is rejected due to his youth. His path leads him instead to treachery as he joins up with the German police. The story… more A World War 2 set French Resistance film with a difference. Lacombe, Lucien takes place in rural France and focuses on Lucien Lacombe, a young man with an obvious mean streak. We are introduced to him in a scene that sees him needlessly kill a bird with a slingshot. He tries to join the French Resistance but is rejected due to his youth. His path leads him instead to treachery as he joins up with the German police. The story… more
Henri · 93 likes
Here's a prime example of a film that I thought was objectively great, but couldn't engage with that much. It's a brave one for sure. Lucien's motives for joining the nazis were portrayed in a poignant way; no defined ideology, just frustration and power. I also really admired the carefully nuanced storytelling and Malle's thoughtfully viscous direction - never flashy, always sharp. But all in all, admiration was the only primary feeling that I got from this.
For some reason,… more