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THE
STATEMENT DOCUMENTS DENAZIFICATION IN FRANCE
AS LATE AS THE 1990s
 The
Vichy regime was a part of France not occupied by the German
military but instead governed by French who were willing to
collaborate with the Nazis. Although much attention has been
directed at Klaus Barbie, the "Butcher of Lyon," less
well known is his French counterpart, known as the "Hangman
of Lyon," Paul Touvier. In 1947, Touvier was indicted
for killing seven Jews at Rillieux-la-Pape near Lyon on June
29, 1944, but he managed to evade capture until 1967, when
the statute of limitations for his crime ran out. His pardon
by President Georges Pompidou in 1971 evoked such a furor that
he was later indicted for committing a "crime against
humanity," and he again evaded capture until 1989, when
he was found in a monastery in Nice that was operated by followers
of Msgr. Marcel Lefebvre, a right-wing cleric whom the Vatican
had excommunicated in 1988. According to Touvier, the Nazis
demanded the deaths of one hundred Jews in retaliation for
the assassination of Vichy Minister of Information Philippe
Henriot by Resistance fighters in Paris, but he bargained the
number down to seven, whereas others claimed that he was Barbie's
enthusiastic assistant. After his conviction in 1994, Touvier
died in a hospital prison in 1996. Based on the novel by Brian
Moore, the film entitled The Statement is
dedicated to the memory of some 77,007 Jews who died in Vichy
France during World War II and changes a few facts of the Touvier
saga to focus on a Pierre Brossard (played by Michael Caine),
who was ordered in Dombey by his commanding officer during
June 1944 to round up seven Jews of the French Resistance who
were also suspected of Communist loyalties; he then supervised
their death by firing squad, including putting the final bullets
into those who did not appear dead. After
the war, Brossard was imprisoned for his role in the massacre,
but a highly placed
friend in the new French Republic arranged his release from
prison, so he was a fugitive from justice thereafter, moving
from one location to another to avoid recapture.
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Members
of a secret anti-Semitic and anti-Communist Catholic group
known
as the Chevalier du Sainte Marie, an ultraconservative group
which believes that the pope is not a true Catholic, gave refuge
to Brossard in various Catholic monasteries, while he was paid
by his benefactor, who ultimately arranged to have the President
of France pardon Brossard for his crime. Brossard, however,
went into hiding again after France's parliament adopted the
Law Against Humanity, which provided a new offense on which
to try him for deeds that had been haunting his dreams and
making him a devout Catholic, desperate to be ready to die
in a "state of grace." The film begins in 1992, when
the Brossard case is assigned to a new prosecutor, half-Jewish
Annmarie Livi (played by Tilda Swinton), and Army Colonel Roux
(played by Jeremy Northam). Meanwhile, a mysterious man by
the name David Joseph Mandelbaum (played by Matt Craven) is
also tracking Brossard's movements with the aim of assassinating
him and then pinning to his dead body a paper entitled "Statement," which
will boast that his death is in retaliation for the Dombey
Massacre. Thus, Brossard has two pursuers, and the action in
the film consists of his flight from arrest or murder in which
he relies on trusted friends, notably those in the clergy,
his estranged wife (played by Charlotte Rampling), right-wing
Catholic extremists affiliated with the Chevalier cabal, and
his own pistol, which he uses to murder Mandelbaum and, later,
Mandelbaum's replacement. In the process, the cinematography
magnificently presents Marseilles, Paris as well as several
Catholic monasteries in Provence. Directed by Normal Jewison, The
Statement, which highlights the inner conflicts
of a man who was ordered to kill and then struggled to remain
a good Catholic, has been nominated by the Political Film Society
for best film exposé and best film in raising consciousness
about human rights for the year 2003. MH
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The
Statement
by Brian Moore
While
Moore's new novel can be called a thriller, it
is in fact another of his stunning moral visions
of modern life (Lies of Silence; The Colors of
Blood) that have marked him as an astute, impassioned
chronicler of 20th-century spiritual malaise.
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