Movies can, and often do, reveal things about our history that we were never taught in school.  This is one of them, and the lesson is that the great mime, Marcel Marceau, actually helped rescue hundreds, if not thousands of children, during World War II as part of the Resistance movement.  Who knew?  Probably everyone in France, where he received the highest civilian award they have, but here in America we never learned about his heroics.  Probably because of the mime thing.

Jonathan Jakubowicz, who also wrote the script, directs this harrowing, tension-fraught story by focusing on the young Marcel Rangel (Jesse Eisenberg) trying to find his place in his French community, and even his own family.  But then war comes, and orphans to care for, and the young actor helps take care of the kids.  Then they have to flee, and everything becomes more serious, and he learns to lead.  By and by he takes a group of kids on a treacherous hike across the Alps to Switzerland with Nazis in hot pursuit.

The film has devastating moments of cruelty (mostly inferred rather than shown), but its primary tone is unease.  Nobody there really knows how bad it is going to get, and then things get much, much worse.  With an international cast, Jakubowicz does a nice job of recreating a world where everything is suspicious and not to be trusted, especially if one is Jewish.  It is a tale of large scope, one in which Marcel takes an ever increasing importance.  Sadly, Jesse Eisenberg is not particularly impressive in the central role, especially in the sequences where he mimes.

This is an important story and certain characters, particularly the two sisters (Clemence Poésy and Vice Kerakes) really carry the narrative forward.  Another oddity is that this story is introduced and bookended by General George S. Patton (Ed Harris) telling American troops all about Marceau’s exploits, before leading in to a very strange mime sequence.  I can’t help wondering what those troops would have thought about the strange display — one that does not measure up to the historical or moral significance of the rest of the movie.  At least the mime stuff doesn’t last long.  ☆ ☆ 1/2.  31 March 2021.