Owen Sheer's Resistance - Film Review

3 Stars

It’s 1944 and the Nazi occupation of Britain has begun and the Resistance have scattered, abandoning their family and friends.

This is where Resistance opens, with farmer’s wife Sarah Lewis (Andrea Riseborough) waking alone in her bed as four men climb the hills away from the valley and a troop of Nazi soldiers entering the valley. Under the guise of occupation, their Captain undertakes the real task – searching for a lost artefact that will allow the Nazi occupiers to provide a certain justification for the war.

Traditional conventions in suspense are abandoned in favour of more menacing undertones of fear and violence. Shots are fired and their end result is clear but each shot pushes the emotional aspect rather than that of the gory, front-line convention of war. Yet in the truest sense of audience suspense we witness the shooting of four men and ambiguity is built as to whether it is the missing husbands only to find out along with Maggie that her husband is very likely dead.

The minimalistic dialogue and stretches of silence throughout the 90 minutes certainly adds substance to the ever present violent undertones and bleak desolation of the valley. Whilst dialogue is not necessarily needed to convey the emotional bridges being traversed by the characters – especially with the language barrier, the lack of dialogue creates frustration for the audience, wanting interaction beyond suggestive body language. In several scenes at the start the women’s silence towards Albrecht (Tom Wlaschiha) the only English speaker in the troupe, is conveyed as a protest towards the Olchan Valley occupation. 

The short sections of film detailing the ‘secret mission’ are exactly that: short - mixing the
mission to find the artefact into the plot feels like an added extra to give Sarah and Albrecht more chance to bond, rather than a greater purpose for soldiers at war. It left me wanting either more made of the secret mission sub-plot, or none at all. Sheen’s part is a cameo, bringing in the resistance element into the film with George (Iwan Rheon), a young boy entrusted with the task of observing and possibly intervening against collaborators. Although Sheen is ceremoniously killed by the German’s once discovered.

Wearied by war, Albrecht sets his men to help the women on their farms as the depths of winter set in and trap them all in the valley: there is a surreal normality set up as the men don civilian clothing, as if life carries on with or without war.

The bond formed between Sarah and Albrecht is endearing and although she still misses her husband Tom, writing to him almost every day in a journal she needs Albrecht’s presence and kindness. Her mind is at war between her memories of her husband and her growing feelings for him.

The end sequence of scenes is the most heart-breaking: it is George’s actions against Maggie’s seen ‘collaboration’ with the soldier in the country fair that brings about the characters final actions. With Maggie’s discovery her husband likely dead and her horse shot dead beside her she goes into shock, followed by the panic of one soldier who runs off with the radio to inform his superior’s. Sarah and Albrecht make to run to the hills yet it is Sarah’s loyalty to Tom that destroys him. She sets fire to the artefact in act of love and betrayal, love for her country and for him yet if German superiors found Albrecht and the destroyed artefact they would kill him as a traitor outright. Sarah wanders off into the hills to find Tom, leaving Albrecht to discover her abandonment as he runs back to the house in fear.

I must admit, one curious part of my evening was my discussion after with a particularly picky historian and it was his opinion that the film’s premise of “Imagine if D-Day had failed...” was historically inaccurate, fictionalized and counter-factual or not, the German occupation of Britain would never have occurred after D-Day or even that late in the war if D-Day hadn’t been planned: in 1941 maybe, not 1944. Although he did admit, that aside, it was a very good film.

For all its slights Resistance is a powerful emotional film with vats of atmosphere and fantastic casting, the use of the landscape is dominating and commands the audience appreciation of its beauty and volatility.