Resistance

Description

Resistance is set in Northern France in 1944, during the Nazi occupation and centres around Jacques, a wealthy man with a wonderful family and a senior member of the French Resistance.

Every night he listens to the cryptic messages broadcast by the BBC from London. Coded within them are the Resistance orders, which Jacques follows dutifully.

One night, Jacques returns from a sabotage mission to find his house ransacked and his family missing. He flees into the woods, taking only his radio.

Jacques' friends bring news that his family has been sent to a concentration camp and that the Germans are hunting him. They tell Jacques to flee but he is adamant that he must continue fighting.

The Germans hunt Jacques down and although he manages to escape, he is injured during a gun battle.

Still refusing to turn his back on the Resistance, Jacques radios London begging for answers. None are received.

Injured and discouraged, Jacques plans to destroy his radio but spots German soldiers bullying an old woman and changes his mind.

Disgusted, Jacques reestablishes the radio and hears the coded message that he has waited five years for - the invasion has arrived!

Jumping forward to 1945, Jacques is reunited with his family.

Biblical Connection

The story is inspired by The Book of Job and concentrates on the theme of belief in the face of adversity. Jacques, like Job, is a truly good man who, even when everything is taken from him, still holds on to his beliefs. The cryptic radio messages from the BBC take the place of God's will and although their meaning is not always clear, Jacques knows that they form part of a larger picture. Jacques' faith is tested by his friends who suggest that he should save himself and flee. However, Jacques values the Resistance above his own fate. Like Job, Jacques also questions the purpose of what he is enduring but receives no response from his superiors across the Channel. At the end of the film, Jacques is finally vindicated as the allied invasion arrives and he is reunited with his family. This again mirrors the story of Job, whose possessions, health and family are restored by God following his devotion.