Monsieur Batignole
Monsieur Batignole | |
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Directed by | Gérard Jugnot |
Produced by |
Gérard Jugnot Olivier Granier Dominique Farrugia |
Written by |
Gérard Jugnot Philippe Lopes-Curval |
Starring |
Gérard Jugnot Michèle Garcia Jules Sitruk Jean-Paul Rouve Götz Burger Alexia Portal |
Music by | Khalil Chahine |
Cinematography | Gérard Simon |
Edited by | Catherine Kelber |
Release date | 6 March 2002 |
Country | France |
Budget | $10.4 million[1] |
Box office | $9 million |
Monsier Batignole is a French film released in 2002. The film was directed by Gérard Jugnot and featured Gérard Jugnot, Jules Sitruk, Jean-Paul Rouve, Götz Burger, Michèle Garcia and Alexia Portal in the lead role. The film depicts the story of French grocer Gérard Jugnot helping a young Jewish boy reach Switzerland safely. The film showed that on one side there were people who wanted to own and enjoy whatever property belonging to the Jews that had been confiscated by the German Army, and on the other were people like Edmond Batignole, who kept his sense of humanity and wanted to help the homeless Jewish boy.
Plot
In 1942, in Paris, which was seized by Germany, a grocer Edmond Batignole (Gérard Jugnot) is living with his family in his grocery building. He has a daughter who is soon to be married. His future son-in-law, Pierre-Jean (Jean-Paul Rouve) and his wife wanted the apartment owned by a Jewish family. When the property of all the Jews was confiscated the Batignole family got the apartment. The Jewish family was sent to transportation to Germany. After the Batignoles had occupied the apartment the Batignoles organise a party for the SS officials and during that party young Simon Bernstein (Jules Sitruk) of the Jewish family who had escaped from the Germans, returns to his home. Edmond Batignole feels sorry for the boy and hides him in the apartment from his family before anyone else could see him. Soon Simon's cousins meet him in the cellar of the grocery and the grocer plans to smuggle the children over the border to Switzerland. Edmond takes the dangerous trip to the border, where he and the children are nearly caught by the police. However, with the help of a kind woman and a priest, they are able to sneak over the border to safety in Switzerland.
Cast
- Jules Sitruk - Simon Bernstein
- Michèle Garcia - Marguerite Batignole
- Gérard Jugnot - Edmond Batignole
- Jean-Paul Rouve - Pierre-Jean Lamour
- Marie-Hélène Lentini - Madame Taillepied
- Alexia Portal - Micheline Batignole
- Arthur Jugnot - Arthur
- Jean-Marie Winling - Sacha Guitry
- Violette Blanckaert - Sarah Cohen
- Daphné Baiwir - Guila Cohen
- Götz Burger - SS Col. Spreich
Reception
Variety's critic Lisa Nesselson wrote that the director "has fashioned a fine package, ready to travel".[2] The film was a box office success in France.[2] The 2002 French Academy of Cinema Best Young Actor award was won by Jean-Paul Rouve in this film. The film was shown at VCU French Film Festival, Cleveland International Film Festival, French Film Festival, Bergen International Film Festival where it once again received huge critical acclaim.
References
- ↑ http://www.jpbox-office.com/fichfilm.php?id=1761
- 1 2 Nesselson, Lisa (22 March 2002). "Monsieur Batignole". Variety. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
External links
- Monsieur Batignole on IMDb
- Monsieur Batignole at AlloCiné (in French)
- Monsieur Batignole at Box Office Mojo
- Monsieur Batignole at Rotten Tomatoes