Of all the resistance movements in World War II, cinema has amply covered the French one, but there is still some room for stories from other countries to be told, as long as they don't play around with facts for effect and yet work as impactful drama. Number 24 ticks both these boxes in relating the story of Gunnar Sønsteby, Norway's most decorated fighter against the German occupation, told by the man himself in extreme old age before an audience of schoolchildren from his home town. The bulk of the film is a flashback to his younger self, leading a group of saboteurs, who eventually end up killing the most prominent Nazi collaborators too. The story is told tautly and without undue dwelling on action or attempts to rouse passions, and the interruptions to the narrative by students from the audience asking naive questions about what Sønsteby personally did and whether it was justified form a neat contrast to the harsh reality of what life was in the war. It would be hard to cover the topic in a more measured and sensitive way than this.
7/10
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