History Vs Hollywood
Is Resistance more pantomime than fact?
Director: Jonathan Jakubowicz Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Clémence Poésy, Matthias Schweighöfer Country: France Released: 2020
01
Early in the film General Patton introduces Marcel Marceau for a performance in the Kongresshalle of Nuremberg in 1945. Marceau was a liaison officer for Patton, but his first performance was in 1944 in the newly liberated Paris in front of 3,000 US troops.
02 As we’re introduced to Marceau he’s already performing in cabaret clubs, much to the dismay of his butcher father. Pre-war, Marcel would’ve been only 15 compared to Jesse Eisenberg’s
36 – a significant difference. He wouldn’t get into miming until later.
03 Marceau teams up with Jewish activists Emma and Mila who are looking after Jewish orphans from Germany in Strasbourg. Both characters are invented, which seems all the more strange when they become the focus of a great deal of suffering later.
04 The primary villain is Klaus Barbie, the real-life ‘Butcher of Lyon’. While the film seems to depict his actions accurately, his post in Lyon is 400km away from where Marceau mainly operated in Limoges and they would never have met despite what the film shows.
05 Finally, Resistance shows the main contribution of Marceau, which was sneaking Jewish children across the Alps into Switzerland. It’s said he used his mime skills to distract them and keep them quiet to avoid detection, which the film shows in the last act.