the guardians…

I went along to the Watershed yesterday afternoon to see Xavier Beauvois’s film “The Guardians” (adapted from Ernest Perochon’s novel), exploring the lives of women who are left behind to work a family farm in rural France during WW1 (a nurse appointment meant I missed the opportunity to see with Moira, Alan and Gareth last week, so it was good to get a belated chance to watch it).
It’s an unhurried, sensitive, beautiful and superbly shot film (cinematographer: Caroline Champetier).
Once the younger men of the community disappear off to war, the women have no option but to take on the task of maintaining the family farm… and they do so with great perseverance and determination (and not a little skill). From the onset, the matriarch (widowed Madame Hortense, wonderfully played by Nathalie Baye) sets about organising things. Her principal worker is daughter Solange (played by Laura Smet) and, subsequently, by a hard-working, cheerful, hired worker, Francine (rather beautifully played by Iris Bry)… who attracts the attention of favourite son, Georges (played by Cyril Descours), and this budding relationship, in turn, enrages a longtime family friend, Margueritte (Mathilde Viseux), who had regarded herself as Georges’s ‘intended’. Probably best if I’ll leave it there… (I would hate to spoil things for you).

The horrors of conflict and their consequences are only referred to quite fleetingly and, instead, the focus is on how the women of this rural community band together to look after the farm, tend cattle and grow food (the ‘old’ men that remain behind seem content to opt out or to concentrate their efforts on producing alcohol!) – and there seems to be an almost grudging resentment from the menfolk of the women’s adaptability and proficiency.

Although the way of life and its seasonal rhythms comes across very powerfully, I think that, for me, it all felt slightly unreal – the sun did seem to shine an awful lot of the time and the main characters in the film were all a little too beautiful!
Nevertheless, I very much enjoyed the film and would highly recommend it.