The Innocents (2016)

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows

One of those movie experiences that is so good it makes you realize you've been grading everything else on a curve.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

ABOUT: Set in Poland, in the aftermath of World War II, a nun seeks the aid of a Red Cross medical volunteer to help tend to her pregnant convent sisters at the risk of scandal and dishonor. REVIEW: "The Innocents" is a very sad yet a precise picture of the place and most of all the people who were and still are being touched by the horrors of war and are trying very hard to keep their faith and regain the reason to move forward in life despite of. Truly, the characters where shown as they struggle in such unbearable circumstances. The film, right from the start was able to establish the tone to convey the general feelings of the characters. Though I have not been present when such events or those similar had happened, it became easier to identify with them and feel emotionally engaged. I credit this to the direction and the cinematography. The film is mostly depicted with sets in snow and moments of deafening silence which for me is perfect because they give the impression of intense feelings of loneliness and hopelessness which are essential to the story being told. Regarding the acting aspect of the film, I felt that every actor/actresses fleshed out their characters by playing the part with the right amount of subtlety and moments of peaks. They were able to exhibit the essential emotions properly and make you empathize with them and feel what they feel easily. These aspects, direction, cinematography, and acting worked well together that I can't seem to detect any flaw within the movie and if there is any, it wouldn't get in the way of how good this movie really is.FINAL WORD: Most people would peg this movie as just another art film and it is so as evident in how well-crafted the movie is. But it's just not that. It's not limited to being an eye candy and does not become solely extrinsic in value and self-indulgent. It is also about a subject of great substance and social interest. While it seems like only a few people had watched the movie (based on IMDb ratings) at this point, "The Innocents" is a good movie; one of the best I have seen with a story that has great emotional appeal this year. It really is a story needed to be told and in my opinion, was given a worthy cinematic treatment. Give it a try.

With seventeen writing and sixteen directing credits on her CV it's fair to say that Anne Fontaine has paid her dues and knows how films are put together; I've seen and enjoyed perhaps a dozen of these but I have no hesitation in saying that The Innocents surpasses anything she has done by a country mile; all I can say is that this is Fontaine's Citizen Kane and in my book that's another way of saying the best there is. It's one of an increasing number of films set in and/or either side of World War Two based on actual incidents, Katyn is another, for example, but it would be wrong to assume that this was sufficient to guarantee success. For that we have to look to the creative term or, to put it another way you can deliver a ton of Carera marble to a sculptor but it's up to the sculptor to fashion it into something outstanding or something mediocre. Fontaine, given her marble and enlisting the aid of three outstanding actresses - Lou de Laage, Agata Buzek and Agata Kulesza - fashioned it into a masterpiece. The plot has been described else where: 1945, Poland. Lou de Laage is working with the French Red Cross. A nun solicits her help, she turns her away. A little later she sees the same nun, on her knees in the snow praying desperately for heavenly intervention. Breaking the rules of her contract she 'borrows' an ambulance and accompanies the nun to the convent where she finds a woman about to give birth. The Abbess, Agata Lulesza, explains that they have taken the girl in out of pity but rejects any help. Another nun, Agata Buzek, speaks French and persuades the Abbess to accept the help of the French doctor. So begins a bonding between the French doctor and the Polish nun. The first revelation is that Russian soldiers visited the convent three times leaving seven nuns pregnant. Later the doctor discovers the Abbess has syphilis. There is, if possible, a final revelation even more horrific than the en masse raping of seven nuns. Shot in colour but muted to resemble black and white, in a bleak Polish winter with virtually no music Fontaine holds the attention effortlessly and has surely coaxed Award winning performances out of the three leads or else there is no justice in the world yet every single performance is A +. The highest praise is not good enough for this film.

According to military historian Antony Beevor, "The subject of the Red Army's mass rapes in Germany and elsewhere has been so repressed in Russia that even today veterans refuse to acknowledge what really happened." A Soviet war correspondent said, "It was an army of rapists," and that Russian soldiers raped every female from eight to eighty. The scale of the rapes that took place is suggested by the fact that about two million women in Europe had illegal abortions every year between 1945 and 1948.Anne Fontaine's ("Coco Before Chanel"), The Innocents (aka Agnus Dei) tells one personal story of the brutality of the "liberating" Red Army from the point of view of a young French doctor, Mathilde (Lou de Laage, "Breathe") caring for French soldiers at a nearby Red Cross hospital. Based on real events, recounted in notes by Madeleine Pauliac, a Red Cross doctor, Mathilde secretly takes time from her hospital duties to serve as a midwife for nuns at a Benedictine convent in Poland in 1945 that have become pregnant as a result of several visits by Russian soldiers. As the film opens, Mathilde is begged by the novice Teresa (Eliza Rycembel, "Carte Blanche") to come to the convent immediately to deliver the child of Sister Zofia (Anna Próchniak, "Warsaw '44"), who is near death.At first reluctant, the doctor is moved by the pleas of the novice and quietly goes to the convent where she performs a C-section to remove the breech baby and save Sister Zofia's life. Shortly afterwards, another nun, Sister Anna (Katarzyna Dabrowska, "Król zycia"), collapses and the truth is revealed to her that the nuns were subjected to the assaults by Russian soldiers who came to the convent on three separate occasions resulting in the pregnancy of six nuns and one novice. Giving assistance to the Abbess (Agata Kulesza, "Ida") and her young assistant Maria (Agata Buzek, "Redemption"), the French doctor is sworn to secrecy to prevent the nuns' pregnancy from becoming a blemish on the reputation of the convent.The ordeal is a test for the nuns' religious faith who must deal with the fear that they will be punished by God for failing to live up to their vow of chastity and Mathilde comes to respect that many of the nuns uphold their beliefs, even though many believe that God has abandoned them. More reflective than others, Polish actress Buzek is remarkable as Maria, a complex nun who admits that being a nun in these circumstances feels like "twenty-four hours of doubt for one minute of hope." When Mathilde has her own close encounter with Russian soldiers who try to rape her at a roadblock, her bond with the nuns rises to a new level of empathy.Though she was raised by Communist parents and is a non-believer, Mathilde develops a close relationship with the nuns and is moved by their devotional chants and returns to the convent each night to deliver the children of the remaining nuns. The Abbess tells Mathilde that the babies are taken to a sympathetic aunt but a deeper secret is hidden. A semi-love interest develops when Mathilde establishes a friendship with Jewish doctor Samuel (Vincent Macaigne, "Two Friends"), her medical supervisor who joins her at the convent to deliver the remaining babies and their engaging conversations are the film's only light note.The Innocents is a heartbreaking film that portrays a community that is helpless in the face of brutality and whose resolve is tested to the breaking point when a death occurs in the convent and the question of the disposition of the newborn children takes us to an unexpected dark place. Lou de Laage is outstanding as the sensitive doctor whose compassion for others allows her to thrive in an uncomfortable situation and whose quick thinking saves the nuns from another encounter with the Russians. Her performance succeeds because she is also one of the innocents, those who are willing to give of themselves to others without standing in judgment.One is reminded of the words of Mother Teresa who said, "If you are kind, people may accuse you of ulterior motives. Be kind anyway. The good you do today may be forgotten tomorrow. Do good anyway. Give the world the best you have and it may never be enough. Give your best anyway." Though it is shot in darker hues and is often bleak, The Innocents is also an uplifting experience.

That's why I go to film festivals, (mostly the Jerusalem Film Festival). For the opportunity of seeing such rare masterpieces. A perfect blend of acting - especially the three leads but there's not a single false note from any of the characters we get to see on screen; Cinematography; and story telling.Lou de Laage, Agata Buzek and Agata Kulesza, are simply superb in their roles, but they are only the cherries on the top of one of the best ensemble works I've ever seen. The cinematography is breathtaking. And the story, it's more than a simple story about the horrors of war, and how it preys on the innocents. It's a story about the morals of faith. About believing in god's grace comes what may, as opposed to believing in the holiness of life. If you get a chance to see it, don't miss it - you won't regret it.