Really Surprised!

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

When I saw the ending of this film, I realised I saw this film as a boy many decades ago.Jean Renoir's, La Grande Illusion is set during The Great War. The film was made in 1937 and so its depiction of the Germans has not been tainted with the actions of the Nazis in World War 2.The story begins with two French officers, Lieutenant Marichal (Jean Gavin) and Captain De Boeldueu (Pierre Fresnay) taken to a Prisoner of War camp where the inmates have been digging a tunnel. After several attempts to escape, the French officers get sent to a castle high up the mountains run by Rauffenstein (Erich von Stroheim.) He is an intimidating looking, flamboyant but courteous officer we met earlier on in the film who treated the captured French officers very civilly.Rauffenstein sees in De Boeldueu an old way of life run by the aristocracy which is now at risk with the growing middle class in Europe with their newly acquired wealth. There are many times we know that De Boeldueu's word as an officer counts more to Rauffenstein.The film as another sub text about people in this camp trying to get along with people of different classes, religion, colour and nationality. One of the person Marichal will eventually escape with is a French Jew, one of the inmates in the camp who is ignored at times by the officers is black. When Marechal is leaving the first camp he tries to tell the incoming British officers about the tunnel they have been digging it falls to deaf ears as they cannot understand French.The inmates are united as they plan to escape, dig the tunnel and hide the dirt. They feel camaraderie when the British officers boost morale by putting on a stage show and the looks on their faces when one of them appears in drag for the first time, highlighting the fact that they have not seen a female for months or years.The film is in French but has a smattering of German and English. In some ways the film set the template for the second world war POW films like The Great Escape but this movie dos not have the tense excitement of such an action film that would follow three decades later. Then again it is more than just a film about prisoners escaping, more a character piece which also makes the film slightly stage bound and even slow moving at times.

Jean Renoir's "The Great Illusion" (1937) is often celebrated as the greatest anti-war film. It takes place during the First World War and was made just before the Second. Back in the day, Franklin Roosevelt stated that everyone who believes in democracy should see the film. Detaching from such political idealism, one might claim that every human being should see it. It's the film in which Renoir's humanism crystallizes, showing that humanity can preserve even in the darkest of nights. A story about POW camps and people escaping them is a tale of eternal love, friendship and yearning for freedom. A proof of its cinematic power is that without showing a scene of actual combat, "The Great Illusion" is the most accurate portrayal of WWI. It seems that every film about the First World War much deal with its mythological position as the death of cultural innocence. Although "The Great Illusion" begins with the war already going on, its opening scene works as a metaphor for the period before the war. We see a man singing in a café when all of a sudden he is called for a mission to transport a general which sounds easy and quick, but then turns into a long and unpredictable chain of events -- talk about dancing off to war. Not only does Renoir reach the fact that WWI was pointless and a consequence of ostentatious nationalism -- arms race, alliances and hostilities -- but also the feeling of transience as aristocracy begins taking its final breaths. In the hour of disappearance, two aristocrats, Bouldieu and Rauffenstein (aptly played by Erich von Stroheim), unite. The old general in "The Rules of the Game" (1939) might say that they are a vanishing breed. It is beautiful and moving that Renoir's nostalgia considering this social transition has no irony whatsoever, despite Renoir's apparent sympathy for the working class. The nostalgia is very tender. All that matters to Renoir is humanity. It is precisely this human sympathy which is the strength of Renoir's cinema. This is present in Renoir's characterization, treatment of the class theme, and his anti-nationalist philosophy of the great illusion. André Bazin's timeless words are worth repeating at this point: "the grand illusions are the illusion of hatred, which arbitrarily divides men who in reality are not separated by anything; the illusion of boundaries, (...) the illusion of races, of social classes (...). The war, the product of hatred and division, paradoxically reveals the falseness of all the barriers of prejudice separating man from man."One of the many reasons for the survival of "The Great Illusion" in the test of time is its realism (that is not afraid of poetry) which travels from the director's style to his world view and attitude towards life in general. Bazin thought that the film was based on the authenticity of human relations. I believe this is a key into understanding the film and its legacy. War is the great illusion because it separates us from one another. Yet, despite darkness and disappointment, Renoir continues to believe in love and humanity.

a touching story. and a powerful warning. precise portrait of a group. and image of a war. one of contemporary films who, in each society, in each period, remains a reflection of present. the secret - Jean Renoir delicacy in create a credible manifesto, the splendid cast - Erich von Stroheim, Dita Parlo or Jean Gabin in admirable roles - and brilliant acting, the wise use of silences and the filming angle. and, sure, the story. it is more than artistic work. or great legend. it remains memorable for the generous honesty. for the symbols - the pelargonium -, for the map of feelings, for the inspired manner to remember basic pieces who defines existence. it is not exactly a lesson. only a memorable meeting. with a masterpiece, of course. but, more important, with yourself.

Released in 1937, Jean Renoir's Grand Illusion remains one of the most revered films of all time seventy five years onward. The story of a group of working class Francophones trying to escape imprisonment during the First World War, the picture has been praised both for its exceptional acting and craft and its driving humanist, anti-war themes. As someone taking in this Renoir classic for the first time, I can attest that the film holds up very well.Grand Illusion follows a company of working class French men imprisoned in a German POW camp during World War I. Amongst them the proletariat Parisian Marechal (Jean Gabin), the French Jew Rosenthal (Marcel Dalio), and a nameless engineer (Gaston Modot) - they are distinct from one another but share an understanding of the futility of the war they're fighting and a desire to escape. This futility is exemplified through the interactions between the Captain of the men, De Boeldieu (Pierre Fresnay), and the head of the German POW camp, Von Rauffenstein (Eric Von Stroheim), who are both aristocrats and share more common ground than the respective lower class men they represent.All of the elements of the film are at a higher tier of quality: the dialogue eloquently written, the performances subtle, the camera movements elegant (Renoir's camera has a way of artfully manoeuvring around rooms and dinner tables, following important characters as they talk and keep the plot moving forward). What truly makes Grand Illusion great though is not these formal elements but the larger statement they are in service of. Renoir was a writer with something to say, and from the scene where the French soldiers band together to put on a talent show to the final sequence where Marechal and Rosenthal are kindly taken in by a young German widow, he drives home his theme of the futility of war by highlighting the common humanity of people.In conclusion, Grand Illusion has aged remarkably well and remains one of the cinema's great masterpieces. Tied with Rules of the Game, it is Renoir's greatest work, and a must-see for anyone with a passing interest in cinema. It's a perfect example of what quality filmmaking is: high artistry in all compartments at the service of a simple but driving truth, in this case the "grand illusion" that war is something worth pursuing.