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Le Silence de la Mer is an adaptation of the novella of the same title by celebrated French Resistance author Vercors (the pen name of Jean Bruller). Clandestinely written in 1942 during the Nazi occupation of France and furtively distributed, it captured the spirit of the moment, and quickly became a staple of the Resistance. Melville's cinematic adaptation partly shot in Vercors own house tells the story of a German officer, Werner von Ebrennac (Howard Vernon), who is billeted to the house of an elderly man (Jean-Marie Robain) and his niece (Nicole Stéphane) in occupied France. One of the most important French films to deal with World War II, and a landmark in Melville's distinguished oeuvre, Le Silence de la Mer is a lyrical, timeless depiction of the experiences and struggles of occupation and resistance. (Eureka Entertainment)
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Melville’s feature movie debut is a great radio play, but a bad movie. Why? Because it suffers from a mass of unnecessary words. We can see riders coming on horses and we hear an inner monolog with information that the riders on horses are coming. We can see a girl coming into a room and at the same time hear inner monolog about a girl coming into a room. The visual side completely lost any meaning in this movie. And to make things worse Robain is terribly stiff and unnatural. Even a simple situation like drinking his evening cup of coffee looks like it is performed by a robot – "now bend a little, take hold of the cup with your right hand, in a smooth motion lift the hand towards your mouth, have a silent sip and in another smooth motion put the cup back on the saucer. Now, repeat the whole action again." On the other hand, Howard Vernon is fantastic, the camera is great too (even though it doesn’t move from the room with the fireplace) and even the story is not bad, as it heralds Melville’s weakness for powerful topics concerning the Second World War.
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