LA GRANDE VADROUILLE ("DON'T LOOK NOW, WE'RE BEING SHOT AT!", 1966)
Details
Resistance is puerile! This week at Ciné-Club, we're keeping it goofy with one of French Cinema's most beloved popular comedies, a grand caper film about a handful of downed British pilots trying to escape occupied France... with a good bit of help from the French underground. Join us this week as we discuss Gérard Oury's rollicking antifascist farce...
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LA GRANDE VADROUILLE ("Don't Look Now, We're Being Shot At!", 1966)
Dir. by Gérard Oury
Watch HERE. You can also find the film in a slightly higher resolution on ok.ru here (might have some ads but the site is safe).
When you're behind enemy lines, you'll take all the help you can get. In the heat of World War II, a wayward RAF plane is shot down over German-occupied France, with several of the airmen managing to parachute to safety moments before peril. Good short-term victory, but they've got a problem - separated from each other and scattered across Paris, the Britons find themselves stranded in densely-populated Nazi territory, with no clear means of egress. Luckily, quiet resistance runs deep among the occupied French population, and with the covert help of some good samaritans (a house painter and an opera conductor), the crew hatches a plan to reunite and make a run for the border. But you know what they say about the best-laid plans - and these plans aren't even necessarily well-laid...
A wonderfully silly romp through the everyday resistance networks of occupied France, La Grande Vadrouille (literally, "The Great Jaunt") is a surprisingly uplifting escapade of cultural camaraderie, bursting with some of mid-century French cinema's zaniest comedic talents. Let's talk about it!
*As a reminder, this is solely a movie discussion group - we encourage you to watch the film independently prior to coming to the meetings.