Tuesday, 16 August 2011

Un Secret (Claude Miller, 2007)

What really works for this real-life-based dissection of a family history on The Holocaust is the focus on the survivors. For a long spell, we're not aware it's to do with the war at all, or Jews, or even the past. An onion is peeled down layer by layer until the heart is finally reached.
What works less well is the superimposition of the modern era framing device - we don't need to see the repercussions to an adult if his past is engraved with such attention. But that's a small quibble, alongside the stretching of characters' ages so the lead's father looks the same in 1962 as he did in 1936: Un Secret manages to bring a life history of an over-visited period alive with a force that documentaries often fall short of. None of the characters are just victims, devils or saints, but fully rounded people.

7/10

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