Main Cast: Cate Blanchett, Billy Crudup, Michael Gambon, Rupert Penry-Jones, Anton Lesser
Release Year: 2001
Country: UK/US
Run Time: 121 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG13
Plot
Based on the best-selling novel by Sebastian Faulks, this drama, set in Europe during World War II, stars Cate Blanchett as Charlotte, a Scottish woman living in London. Charlotte falls in love with Peter (Rupert Penry-Jones), a handsome RAF pilot, and the two are soon caught up in a torrid affair. Before long, Peter is sent off on a mission over France, and Charlotte receives word that Peter has been reported missing in action. Fluent in French and desperate to find the man she loves, Charlotte volunteers for work with British intelligence and is soon smuggled into France where she is to work with French resistance forces, posing as a woman from Paris. As Charlotte goes about her duties and tries to find Peter, she finds herself drawn to Julien (Billy Crudup), a Communist working with resistance forces. Charlotte is assigned to pose as a domestic at the home of Julien's father, Levade (Michael Gambon), where he's hiding two Jewish boys whose parents have been captured by Nazi troops. In order to maintain her cover and protect Julien, Levade, and the boys, Charlotte finds herself drawn into a relationship with Renech (Anton Lesser), a busybody schoolteacher who is collaborationg with the occupation troops. Directed by Gillian Armstrong, Charlotte Gray also features James Fleet, Ron Cook, and Helen McCrory. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Review
Charlotte Gray had both the credentials and the post-Christmas release date of a traditional Oscar hopeful. Not only was it a World War II/Holocaust drama sprinkled with romance and intrigue, starring a recent Oscar nominee (Cate Blanchett), but the director (Gillian Armstrong) was known for her finesse with female-oriented material (Little Women). None of this helped Charlotte Gray reach a wide audience, and it utterly failed to register. Never less than stately and competent, the film suffers from a lack of clarity in both the plot and the performances. Charlotte's narrative function as a spy is even harder to pinpoint than Billy Crudup's indifferent French accent. Blanchett herself is incapable of being bad, but she bears the weight of Armstrong's overly emotional directing style, which whips numerous scenes into angst-ridden frenzies, often without justification. Armstrong's intended epic sweep is born out by the cinematography and the faithful attention to period design. But her adaptation of Sebastian Faulks' novel owes too much to wartime romances like The English Patient and The End of the Affair, without carrying the weight or distinction to join their rank. Armstrong believes that war naturally engenders heroes and lends grandeur to each desperate human action. She forgets that universal acclaim is not so easy to come by for historical melodramas -- especially when they lack the ring of truth. ~ Derek Armstrong, All Movie Guide
James Fleet - Richard Cannerley; Ron Cook - Mirabel; Jack Shepherd - Pichon; Nicholas Farrell - Mr. Jackson; Helen McCrory - Francoise; Abigail Cruttenden - Daisy; Charles Condou - Auguste
Credit
Tatiana Lund - Art Director, Su Whitaker - Art Director, David Allday - Supervising Art Director, Cathy Lord - Associate Producer, Catherine Kerr - Co-producer, Elinor Day - Co-producer, Janty Yates - Costume Designer, Mark Turnbull - First Assistant Director, Gillian Armstrong - Director, Nicholas Beauman - Editor, Paul Webster - Executive Producer, Hanno Huth - Executive Producer, Robert Bernstein - Executive Producer, Stephen Warbeck - Composer (Music Score), Joseph Bennett - Production Designer, Dion Beebe - Cinematographer, Sarah Curtis - Producer, Douglas Rae - Producer, Joanne Woollard - Set Designer, Clive Winter - Sound/Sound Designer, Jeremy Brock - Screenwriter, Sebastian Faulks - Book Author
In 1942, a young Scot, Charlotte Gray, travels to London to take a job as a medical receptionist for a Harley Street doctor. On the train she talks to a man who enters her compartment, he "interviews" her and gives her his card. Despite the war, social life in London is in full swing and the attractive, intelligent girl soon meets up with Flight Lieutenant Peter Gregory. Soon her meeting is interrupted by the man from the train, he urges her to call him. The temporary nature of life at the time is epitomized when she quickly loses her heart to Gregory. They speak on the nature of war and bravery, Charlotte tells him she thinks she is being asked to try out for some secret organization, Gregory tells her not to get involved in the war. Gregory tells her his leave is over, he is to take part in operations over France for the next couple weeks.
Charlotte joins the SOE and is seconded to FANY with the rank of Driver. She completes her initial training and on leave when news comes back to Charlotte that Gregory's plane has gone down and he is missing in action.
Charlotte spent much of her childhood in France and speaks the language fluently, a talent that got her noticed by the SOE. She signs up for operations in France and is dropped into France with two other men, her mission is to complete a test run; a handover of some radio valves.
She assists at a parachute drop but then settles down as housekeeper to an aging and no longer inspired painter, father of her main resistance contact, Julien. She also helps to conceal two Jewish children, André and Jacob, after their parents are arrested and deported, and as 1942 progresses we learn about the steadily growing oppression of the Jews in France with complicity by the Vichy French government. The painter is interviewed about his Jewish ancestry, and when he stays silent, Julien admits the Jewish ancestry of both his father and himself in order to save the two little boys. The painter is then packed off to the prison camp/transfer station, but Julien is not taken, as he is not as Jewish as his father according to the law. The two boys are taken anyway, and Charlotte writes a letter to them and signs it from their mother, knowing how much they miss her. She runs to pass it through a hole in the wall of the train cargo box they share with Julien's father and many others, all saying goodbye to loved ones running along with the train. At the end of the war, she is reunited with Peter, but she explains that she has grieved him since she was told that he had died.
At the end of the film, she returns to France and Julien, who she has fallen in love with.
The film was not commercially successful for FilmFour. It's financial failure led to a subsequent restructuring and reduction at the production company.
