‘A Man of His Time’ Review: Swann Arlaud Excels in a Provocative and Pained Portrait of a Self-Deluding Vichy France Collaborator
The 'Anatomy of a Fall' co-star brilliantly outlines the collaborationist mindset in a lengthy but inventively unflinching historical drama based on the experiences of director Emmanuel Marre's own great-grandfather.
Plus IconJessica Kiang
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In these terrible, wounded times, when geopolitical upheaval has consequences so personal we might trip over them at our own doorsteps, and when our own attempts to live normal lives come freighted with guilt that we’re essentially dancing while others die, there is sobering value in a film like Emmanuel Marre‘s unsparing “A Man of His Time,” the director’s solo feature debut after co-directing 2021’s impressively scathing “Zero Fucks Given.” This World War II-era drama, rather than celebrating or vilifying the heroic/villainous stories of the exceptional few, shifts focus onto a representative of the unexceptional many — a man “of his time” who, through his actions and silences and willful self-delusion, reaps the benefits of an evil ideology without ever believing himself to be its fellow traveller.
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