The Second World War is raging. In Poland, Irena Gut, a nursing student, finds herself requisitioned against her will by the Nazi occupiers. Resourceful, resilient, the young woman falls into the eye of Colonel Rügemer, who decides to make her the governess of his opulent country residence. However, without the knowledge of her employer, Irena has become the protector of twelve Jewish people, whom she hides in the cellar of the villa. Between an overly curious neighbor, unexpected visitors and a Rügemer who begins to take a little too much interest in his employee, the danger grows. Based on an incredible but true story, Irena’s Vow (Irena’s Promise) stars Sophie Nélisse in the role of a very inspiring heroine.
A co-production between Canada and Poland, where the film was shot, Irena’s Vow must be seen for several reasons. First of all, the excellent Sophie Nélisse, revealed very little in Mr. Lazhar and recently appreciated in the series Yellowjacketsdelivers an extremely felt performance in the lead role.
The Quebec actress proves adept, among other things, at combining apparent calm and underlying anxiety during the many moments when her character’s subterfuge risks being discovered. We also think of these passages where the horrors of war are evoked through Irena’s reactions: the sequence where a Nazi seizes a baby in the street is almost unbearable even if, technically, it is especially the frightened and then traumatized face of Irena which is shown.
This is a wise directorial choice: the film contains several of them. This is not surprising, since Irena’s Vow was directed by Louise Archambault, an emeritus filmmaker to whom we owe in particular Gabrielle And It was raining birds : it constitutes another reason to see the film.
Behind the camera, in a difficult context detailed in the interview she gave us last week, the director breathes emotion and urgency into situations sometimes mechanically written by Dan Gordon, who adapted his own play. Supported by Paul Sarossy as photo director (The Sweet Hereafter/Beautiful tomorrows), Louise Archambault was able to create a film that is increasingly suffocating, increasingly anxiety-provoking.
The action thus begins in the city, with a broader spectrum of action, notably in the streets and at the hospital, then, as soon as the plot moves to Rügemer’s property, the confinement increases. As the noose tightens on Irena and her companions in misfortune hidden in a secret corner, the heart becomes exhausted and the breath becomes short.
Feminine heroism
Finally, Irena’s Vow must be seen because it is an all too rare film dedicated not to a real hero, but to a real heroine of the Second World War. In the cinema, these stories are overwhelmingly conjugated in the masculine, they salute the bravery of an Oskar Schindler in Schindler’s List (Schindler’s List), of a Nicholas Winton in One Life (A life) or, more often, soldiers on the battlefield.
In fact, the list of films based on real feats of arms that occurred during the 1939-1945 war, the most frequently revisited by Hollywood, is endless. And all these tributes written on film or hard drive are justified, of course.
Nevertheless, if there is one observation that is obvious after having seen Irena’s Vow, is that the heroism of women during this conflict remains too little addressed in cinema. Even the main person concerned, Irena Gut Opdyke as she was later known, only made her story public thirty years after the fact, in order to counter the negationist movement, and not for her own glory: a very discreet heroine, this is the case for to say it.
At the end of Louise Archambault’s film, we may wonder how many other Irenas continue to be ignored by History, and by cinema.