| Merry Christmas | |
|---|---|
 Theatrical release poster | |
| Directed by | Christian Carion |
| Written by | Christian Carion |
| Produced by | Christophe Rossignon Benjamin Herrmann |
| Starring | Benno Fürmann Guillaume Canet Daniel Brühl Diane Kruger Gary Lewis Alex Ferns |
| Cinematography | Walther Vanden Ende |
| Edited by | Judith Rivière Kawa Andrea Sedlácková |
| Music by | Philippe Rombi |
| Distributed by | UGC Distribution (France) Senator Film (Germany)[1] Sony Pictures Classics[2] (throughColumbia TriStar Film Distributors International; United Kingdom) Big Bang Media (Belgium) Media Pro Pictures (Romania)[3] |
Release date |
|
Running time | 116 minutes |
| Countries | France Germany United Kingdom Belgium Romania Japan |
| Languages | French English German |
| Budget | $22 million[4] |
| Box office | $17.7—23.1 million[1][4] |
Joyeux Noël (English:Merry Christmas) is a 2005wardrama film based on theChristmas truce of December 1914, depicted through the eyes ofFrench,Scottish, andGerman soldiers. It was written and directed byChristian Carion,[5] and screened out of competition at the2005 Cannes Film Festival.[6]
The film, which includes one of the last appearances ofIan Richardson before his death, was nominated forBest Foreign Language Film at the78th Academy Awards. It is a fictionalised account of an actual event that took place in December 1914, whenWilhelm, German Crown Prince, sent the lead singer of theBerlin Imperial Opera company on a solo visit to thefront line. Singing by thetenor, Walter Kirchhoff, to the120th and 124th Württemberg regiments led Scottish soldiers in their trenches to stand up and applaud.[7]
The story centres mainly upon six characters: Gordon (a Lieutenant of theRoyal Scots Fusiliers); Audebert (a French Lieutenant in the 26th Infantry and reluctant son of a general); Horstmayer (aJewish German Lieutenant of the93rd Infantry); Father Palmer (aScottish priest working as achaplain andstretcher-bearer); and two famousopera stars, Germantenor Nikolaus Sprink (based onWalter Kirchhoff)[citation needed] and hisDanish fiancée,mezzo-soprano Anna Sørensen.
The film begins with scenes of schoolboys reciting patriotic speeches that both praise their countries and condemn their enemies. In Scotland, two young brothers, Jonathan and William, join up to fight, followed by theirpriest, Father Palmer, who becomes achaplain. In Germany, Sprink is interrupted during a performance by a German officer announcing areserve call up. French soldier Audebert looks at a photograph of his pregnant wife, whom he has had to leave behind (in theoccupied part of France, just in front of his trench), and prepares to exit into the trenches for an Allied assault on German lines. However, the assault fails, with the French and British taking many casualties while William loses his life.
In Germany, Anna gets permission to perform forCrown Prince Wilhelm, and Sprink is allowed to accompany her. They spend a night together and then perform. Afterward, Sprink expresses bitterness at the comfort of the generals at their headquarters and resolves to go back to the front to sing for the troops. Sprink initially opposes Anna's decision to go with him, but he agrees shortly afterward.
The unofficial truce begins when the Scots begin to sing festive songs and songs from home, accompanied bybagpipes. Sprink and Sørensen arrive on the German front line, and Sprink sings for his comrades. As Sprink sings "Silent Night", he is accompanied by Father Palmer's bagpipes from the Scottish front line. Sprink responds to Palmer and exits his trench with a small Christmas tree, singing "Adeste Fideles". Following Sprink's lead, Audebert, Horstmayer, and Gordon meet inno-man's-land and agree on acease-fire for the evening.
The various soldiers meet and wish each other "Joyeux Noël", "Frohe Weihnachten", and "Merry Christmas". They exchange chocolate, champagne, and photographs of loved ones. Horstmayer gives Audebert back his wallet containing a photograph of his wife, which was lost in the attack a few days prior, and they connect over pre-war memories. Father Palmer celebrates a briefMass for the soldiers (inLatin as was the practice in theCatholic Church at that time), and the soldiers retire deeply moved. However, Jonathan remains totally unmoved by the events around him, choosing to grieve for his brother. The following morning, the Lieutenants agree to extend the truce to allow each side to bury their dead, followed by cordial fraternisation for the rest of the day. As their soldiers play football, Audebert and Horstmayer sympathise, speaking in French of their memories ofParis andLens, and their families. Horstmayer offers to take a letter to Lens for Audebert's wife. The next day, as the German forces shell the Allied position, Horstmayer offers to shelter the French and British soldiers in his trench, an offer Audebert and Gordon return to protect the Germans from their own retaliatory bombing. Before parting, aware that the truce has now truly ended, Audebert and Horstmayer lament that they cannot be friends, and hope that they both survive the war. As Audebert compliments Horstmayer on his French, the German reveals that his wife is French.
Prior to the bombing, Horstmayer learns that Anna and Sprink left without the German superior's assent to entertain fellow front soldiers and informs both that Sprink is going to be arrested for disobedience. As the Germans regain their trenches, Anna and Sprink remain behind and ask Audebert to take them as captives, in order to avoid separation. Letters that they hand over to him from the German soldiers (who had been hoping Anna would deliver them when she returned toBerlin), as well as letters from soldiers all across the front, are intercepted by military authorities, revealing that the truce had occurred.
Father Palmer is being sent back to his own parish and his battalion is disbanded as a mark of shame. Despite emphasising the humanity and goodwill of the truce, he is rebuked by thebishop, who then preaches ananti-German sermon to new recruits, in which he describes the Germans as inhumane and commands the recruits to kill every one of them. Father Palmer overhears the sermon and removes his cross as he leaves.
Back in the trenches, the Scots are ordered by a furious English major (who is angered by the truce) to shoot a German soldier who is entering no-man's-land and crossing towards French lines. All of the soldiers deliberately miss in response, except the bitter Jonathan, who shoots the targeted German soldier. Audebert, hearing the familiar alarm clock ringing outside, rushes out and discovers that the soldier is a disguised Ponchel, hisbatman. With his dying words, Ponchel reveals he gained help from the German soldiers, visited his mother, and had coffee with her. He also informs Audebert that he has a young son named Henri.
Audebert is punished by being sent toVerdun, and he receives a dressing down from his father, a general. In a culminating rant, young Audebert upbraids his father, expressing no remorse at thefraternisation at the front, and his disgust for civilians and superiors who talk of sacrifice but know nothing of the struggle in the trenches. He also informs the general about his new grandson Henri. Moved by this revelation, the general then recommends they "both try and survive this war for him".
Horstmayer and his troops, who are confined in a train, are informed by the German Crown Prince that they are to be shipped to theEastern Front, without permission to see their families as they pass through Germany. He then stomps on Jörg's harmonica and says that Horstmayer does not deserve hisIron Cross. As the train departs, the Germans start humming acarol they learnt from the Scots. (The carol in question, "L'Hymne des Fraternisés" / "I'm Dreaming of Home", is in fact a modern composition byLori Barth andPhilippe Rombi.)
Carion's youth was spent in his parents' farm fields in Northern France, where he was constantly reminded of World War I as the family often found dangerous unexploded shells left over from the conflicts in the fields. He had also heard of the stories in which French soldiers would leave their trenches at night to meet with their wives in the surrounding German-occupied towns and return to fight the next morning.[8] Carion stated that he'd never heard of the actual Christmas truce incidents while growing up in France, as the French Army and authorities suppressed them, having been viewed as an act of disobedience. He was introduced to the stories via a historian who showed him photos and documents archived in France, the United Kingdom, and Germany, and became fascinated.[9] He tried to portray all of the soldiers with equal sympathy, as "the people on the frontline can understand each other because they are living the same life and suffering the same way", so he could understand how the truce could have come about.[8] He endeavored to stay true to the real stories, but one of the things he had to change was the fate of the cat that crossed into various trenches. In reality, the cat was accused of spying, arrested by the French Army and then shot by afiring squad, as an actual traitor would have been. The extras in the movie refused to participate in this scene, so it was amended to have the cat imprisoned.[10]
Kevin Puts' 2011 operaSilent Night is based on theJoyeux Noël screenplay.[11]
Joyeux Noël has an approval rating of 74% onreview aggregator websiteRotten Tomatoes, based on 112 reviews, and an average rating of 6.8/10.The website's critical consensus states, "The poignant humanity on display inJoyeux Noël makes its sentimentality forgivable".[13]Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 70 out of 100, based on 26 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[14]
Stephen Holden, film critic forThe New York Times, liked the motion picture and wrote, "If the film's sentiments about the madness of war are impeccably high-minded, why then doesJoyeux Noël ...feel as squishy and vague as a handsome greeting card declaring peace on earth? Maybe it's because the kind of wars being fought in the 21st century involve religious, ideological and economic differences that go much deeper and feel more resistant to resolution than the European territorial disputes and power struggles that precipitated World War I... Another reason is that the movie's cross-section of soldiers from France, Scotland and Germany are so scrupulously depicted as equal-opportunity peacemakers that they never come fully to life as individuals."[15]
CriticRoger Ebert also wrote about the sentimentality of the film, "Joyeux Noël has its share of bloodshed, especially in a deadly early charge, but the movie is about a respite from carnage, and it lacks the brutal details of films likePaths of Glory ...Its sentimentality is muted by the thought that this moment of peace actually did take place, among men who were punished for it, and who mostly died soon enough afterward. But on one Christmas, they were able to express what has been called, perhaps too optimistically, the brotherhood of man."[16]
| Award | Category | Recipient | Result |
|---|---|---|---|
| Academy Awards | Best Foreign Language Film of the Year | Nominated | |
| BAFTA Film Award | Best Film not in the English Language | Christophe Rossignon andChristian Carion | Nominated |
| César Awards | Best Film | Nominated | |
| Best Supporting Actor | Dany Boon | Nominated | |
| Best Original Screenplay | Christian Carion | Nominated | |
| Best Original Music | Philippe Rombi | Nominated | |
| Best Costume Design | Alison Forbes-Meyler | Nominated | |
| Best Production Design | Jean-Michel Simonet | Nominated | |
| Golden Globes | Best Foreign Language Film | Nominated | |
| Leeds International Film Festival | Audience Award | Won | |
| Best Feature | Christian Carion | Won | |
| Valladolid International Film Festival | Critics' Award | Won |
