The Little Soldier (1963)

★ 6.9 1h 27m IMDb
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Despite his lack of political convictions, photojournalist Bruno Forestier is roped into a paramilitary group waging a shadow war in Geneva against the Algerian independence movement.

The Little Soldier

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Cast

Michel Subor
Michel Subor as Bruno Forestier Died 2022 · Paris, France Michel Subor (February 2 1935 - January 17 2022) was a French actor who gained fame playing the lover of Brigitte Bardot's character in La Bride sur le Cou (1961). In Hollywood Subor starred in Clive...
Anna Karina
Anna Karina as Veronica Dreyer Died 2019 · Solbjerg, Denmark Anna Karina  (22 September 1940 - 14 December 2019) was a Danish film actress, director, and screenwriter who spent most of her working life in France. Karina was known as a muse of the director Jean-...
Henri-Jacques Huet
Henri-Jacques Huet as Jacques Died 2009 · Paris, France Henri-Jacques Huet was born on 27 March 1930 in Paris, France. He was an actor, known for The Little Soldier (1963), La mort d'un touriste (1975) and Claudine (1978). He died on 4 June 2009 in Nice, A...
László Szabó
László Szabó as Laszlo Age 90 · Budapest, Hungary László Szabó (born 24 March 1936) is a Hungarian actor, film director and screenwriter. Since 1952, he has appeared in more than 120 films. These include seven films that have been screened at the Can...
Georges de Beauregard
Georges de Beauregard as Activist Leader (uncredited) Died 1984 · Marseille, Bouches-du-Rhône, France Georges de Beauregard (23 December 1920 Marseille – 10 September 1984 Paris) was a French film producer who produced works by many of the French New Wave directors. In 1968, he was a member of the jur...
Jean-Luc Godard
Jean-Luc Godard as Man at Railway Station (uncredited) Died 2022 · Paris, France Jean-Luc Godard (December 3, 1930 – September 13, 2022) was a French-Swiss film director, screenwriter and film critic. He rose to prominence as a pioneer of the 1960s French New Wave film movement an...

Audience Reviews

CRCulver 6/10 Aug 26, 2018
Shot in 1960, but banned until 1963 due to its frank treatment of French torture of Algerian separatists, Jean-Luc Godard's <i>Le petit soldat</i> is a political thriller mixed with a love story. Bruno (Michel Subor) is a French agent in Geneva, fighting a secret war against Arab spies supporting the Algerian cause. Tired of his superiors' demands that he assassinate another agent to prove his loyalty, he dreams of escaping to Brazil with the lovely Danish young lady Veronica (Anna Karina). Will they make it or not?

I am assuming that anyone who is considering this film has already seen Godard's first film Breathless. Love it or hate it, it's a 20th-century classic and something any film buff should see. Godard's second film here initially seems to follow the same plot, where a man playing a deadly game of cat and mouse flirts with a woman who is oblivious to the danger he's in, and there are some gratuitous jump cuts too. However, <i>Le petit soldat</i> has some twists and turns in its action and is no retread of its predecessor. Furthermore, the editing is tighter and the mise-en-scène more powerful; already one feels that Goddard has matured to the level of his following films of the 1960s.

To audiences half a century later, when the Algerian War is slowly forgotten even by the French, this may not seem a very in-your-face political commentary. However, Godard does include a few bitter references to World War&nbsp;II, suggesting that the same forces who righteously held out against Hitler only fifteen years before are now the aggressors against their colonial territory. While this is a less-talked-about Godard film, for me at least it has proven more thought-provoking than <i>Breathless</i>, raising moral questions that remain relevant in Europe today, and featuring some shocking plot developments.

Karina's role in this film is a very interesting one. Karina had arrived in France not long before and still spoke only rudimentary French, so Godard gave her a minimum of lines. For the most part, she is a mere Barbie doll, a symbol of Bruno's infatuation. As if underline that Karina is serving only as a delight for the eye, Godard has Bruno photograph her for several minutes while she stands in various poses. As Godard's subsequent films revealed, Karina wasn't just looks, she had considerable talent as an actress, but her part here does not allow that to come through.

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