LA CHAMBRE DES OFFICIERS (THE OFFICER’S WARD)

France, 2001, 135 minutes, Colour.
Eric Caravaca, Denis Podalydes, Gregori Derangere, Sabine Azema, Andre Dussollier.
Directed by Francois Dupeyron.

The Officer’s Ward is based on a novel by Marc Dugain whose ancestor experienced something of what is portrayed in the film. The director is Francoise Dupeyron who was to go on to make the moving Monsieur Ibrahim and the Flowers of the Koran with Omar Sharif.

The setting is World War One. Eric Caravaca (Son Frere, Monsier Ibrahim) is out on a reconnaissance to find a place to build a bridge when there is an explosion and his face is disfigured. He is taken to hospital, to the empty officer’s ward while all the rest of the soldiers are being crowded into the lower wards. He gradually discovers two other soldiers who have also experienced disfigurement. At first pitying himself, contemplating suicide, he comes to terms with himself and is able to help the other men. Meanwhile the nurse, Sabine Azema, supervises the recovery over a period of years. Veteran French actor Andre Dussollier is the surgeon.

The film builds slowly. In the first part of the film the audience does not see the face of the injured man, building up, as with The Elephant Man, a sense of disfigurement which is finally seen. Other comparisons might be made with the World War One film Johnny Got His Gun with Timothy Bottoms as a torso without limbs and whose life is restricted to his mind and consciousness. This is also the case with The Diving Bell and The Butterfly, the story of the editor who had lock-in paralysis and was able to communicate only by blinking his eyelids.

The film recreates the period with great attention to detail. One experiences the atmosphere of the First World War. There are also flashbacks where the central character appears not as sympathetic as one might have expected, rather self-centred, free in his relationship with women, but his injuries and the time spent in hospital give him the time to reassess his life as well as his character and find some kind of redemption. Visitors are unable to deal with his disfigurement, family find it difficult to communicate. However, he finally leaves hospital – with a symbolic scene as he frightens a little girl and then turns the experience into a game for her and she is able to be comfortable with him.

This is a film of great humanity – and even beauty in the world of disfigurement.

1.The impact of the film? As drama? As a portrait of suffering? As a perspective on war? Anti-war? Hope and survival?

2.The adaptation of a novel for the screen, its sweep? Opening it out?

3.France in 1914-18? The atmosphere of World War One? The shock to the French? The invasion of the Germans? The station, the war, the travel to hospital? The ward itself? Outings, the aftermath? The moving score?

4.The title, the focus, the officers, the other soldiers? The ward itself, the treatment of the soldiers?

5.Adrien? The introduction to him, his mission, the accident, his plight, travel to the hospital, audience sympathy? Medals? The lack of room? Clemence? The engineer? Adrien’s knowledge of what had happened or not?

6.The search for the site, the explosion, its effect? Adrien being saved, the difficulty of the transport, the bumps, the injuries, the heat? The device of Adrien’s interior voice? The voices of others? The diagnosis? The noise?

7.The effect on Adrien, his life in the ward, alone, suicidal, recovering, the time passing, four years? The interactions with Pierre, Henri? The Catholic, the Jew? Suicide attempts? Recovery? Marguerite, her visits? The effect of time? Mirrors and windows?

8.The character of Anais? A nurse, her sympathy, seen as an angel, her son, caring for the soldiers, the food, the relationship with the doctor?

9.The cheerful doctor, the science background, the operations, the skin grafts, their not taking, the baby, the ultimate change?

10.The other members of the staff, the detail of life, the routines? Cecile? The pretending to be a corpse? Jokes for survival? The rules?

11.Alain, not looking away, the visits, Clemence and her letter? Deciding to go? Death? Armistice Day?

12.The device of the letters home, the information, their being received?

13.The officer, in the hospital, his family rejecting him?

14.Adrien, his character, change, before the war, his face, accepting it, Clemence? The background of the bordello? Marguerite and the talk? His sister? The gradual change in him?

15.The end of the war, the effect on France, four years at war, the aftermath?

16.Adrien leaving, the doctor and his letting him go? Anais and her farewell? Her influence on his life?

17.Marguerite, her story of the bomb, coward?

18.At home, his mother, rest, the collapse, Clemence?

19.The incident in the Metro, the child and her fear, his playing the game, making the child laugh?

20.Clemence, the earring?

21.The accident, the wedding, everybody present?

22.The birth, the baby, the aftermath of the wars, time moving on?

23.The range of themes, the canvas of characters, of war issues, of injuries and recovery, of despair and hope? The period between the wars? World War Two on the horizon?