As a fan of WW11-based French movies I caught this one in Paris last month. In their wisdom the selection committee for the London Film Festival have ignored the slightly superior 'Bon Voyage', released earlier this year and plumped for this one under the dubious anglicized title 'Strayed'. Les Egares translates literally as 'The Misled', which is only slightly less cumbersome, though more accurate, than 'Strayed' which is ambiguous to say the least. What we have is Emmanuelle Beart playing down her chocolate-box beauty and giving us the harassed mother with two kids ducking and diving in Occupied France to avoid strafing by Stukas. Street-wise Yvan latches on to the family and because his live-off-the-land knowhow is invaluable Odile (Beart) tolerates him. They find an abandoned château and decide to tough it out for the duration which allows the uneasy sexual attraction to simmer nicely. Beart, who suffered the tragic loss of her real-life partner earlier this year, acquits herself well but overall the movie is low on the totem-pole of recent movies set against this backdrop - already this year, in addition to 'Bon Voyage', we have had (in France, that is) Effroyables Jardins (Strange Gardens) with Jacques Villeret and Andre Dussolier turning in great performances albeit in a much lighter vein, last year's Monsieur Batignole is also a contender while the one they all have to beat is Tavernier's standout 'Laissez-Passer'. In sum: see it for Beart and the photography.
Review of Strayed
