''The Confession'' (french: L'aveu) is a 1970 French-Italian film directed by

Costa-Gavras Costa-Gavras (short for Konstantinos Gavras; el, Κωνσταντίνος Γαβράς; born 12 February 1933) is a Greek-French film director, screenwriter, and producer who lives and works in France. He is known for films with political and s ...

starring

Yves Montand Ivo Livi (), better known as Yves Montand (; 13 October 1921 – 9 November 1991), was an Italian-French actor and singer. Early life Montand was born Ivo Livi in Monsummano Terme, Italy, to Giovanni Livi, a broom manufacturer, Ivo held stron ...

and

Simone Signoret Simone Signoret (; born Simone Henriette Charlotte Kaminker; 25 March 1921 – 30 September 1985) was a French actress. She received various accolades, including an Academy Award, three BAFTA Awards, a César Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, a ...

. It is based on the true story of the Czechoslovak communist committed leftist

Artur London Artur London (1 February 1915 – 8 November 1986) was a Czechoslovakia, Czechoslovak communist politician and co-defendant in the Slánský Trial in 1952. Though he was sentenced to life in prison, he was freed in 1955; he then settled in Fr ...

, a defendant in the Slánský trial. Gavras did not intend the film as an anti-communist film but as a plea against

totalitarianism Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and regu ...

and Stalinism.

Plot

Artur Ludvik, alias Gerard, is a loyal communist and hero of WWII who serves as the vice-minister of Foreign Affairs of

Czechoslovakia , rue, Чеськословеньско, , yi, טשעכאסלאוואקיי, , common_name = Czechoslovakia , life_span = 1918–19391945–1992 , p1 = Austria-Hungary , image_p1 ...

in 1951. He realizes he is being watched and followed, and meets to discuss this with a group of his friends who have also attained top government positions. They realize they are all being watched, even the chief of the same secret police force that is carrying out the surveillance. One day, Artur is arrested and jailed by an organization that declares itself "above the ruling party", and put in solitary confinement for months without being told the reason why. His wife Lise and their children are kept in the dark by the government and told to cooperate for their own good; Lise is later removed from her job as a prominent radio news announcer and forced to work in a factory by the party. Though she believes in her husband, she is equally certain in the wisdom and ultimate goodness of the party. Through brainwashing techniques, including sleep deprivation and being forced to walk back and forth all the time, Artur is slowly pressured into confessing imaginary crimes, including treason, and baited with the prospect of leniency at sentencing if he cooperates. He also learns that his friends have been arrested as well and are implicating him in crimes against the state. Upon finally confessing to his alleged crimes, Artur is then groomed for a public "

trial In law, a trial is a coming together of parties to a dispute, to present information (in the form of evidence) in a tribunal, a formal setting with the authority to adjudicate claims or disputes. One form of tribunal is a court. The tribunal ...

", which will be broadcast live on radio and shown in cinemas. While his captors coach him to memorize prepared answers by rote, he is given robust meals, vitamin injections, and a sunlamp to improve his appearance after years of wasting. At the trial, Artur and his colleagues faithfully play their parts. Lise, to her shame, is forced to make a recorded statement disavowing her husband and praising the party which airs during the trial. The prisoners are variously sentenced to either death or life imprisonment, with Artur given the latter. When their interrogators do not return to them, the prisoners panic and threaten to appeal, but are told by their court-appointed lawyers that the sentences are only for the party's benefit and will not be enforced if they do not appeal. The convicted men appear in court one final time to accept their sentences and waive their right to appeal. Afterwards, Artur and some of his colleagues are gradually freed and rehabilitated between 1956 and 1963. However, the rest are executed and cremated, with their ashes scattered along a road. At the same time, a number of the officials behind the ordeal end up facing their own persecutions, including Kohoutek, Artur's own interrogator. Artur later encounters the demoted Kohoutek, who tries to downplay his role in Artur's torment by claiming he was only following orders and never understood what the party wanted. In 1968, Artur completes his memoirs of his experiences in captivity and returns to Czechoslovakia to have them published. By then, amidst the Prague Spring, the reactionary elements who had orchestrated the entire affair had been pushed out of power by the party, and Artur believed that the party now desired to expose the truth of what happened during those years as much as Artur himself did. Unfortunately, he arrives in Prague just as the

Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia The Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia refers to the events of 20–21 August 1968, when the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was jointly invaded by four Warsaw Pact countries: the Soviet Union, the Polish People's Republic, the People's Rep ...

begins.

Cast

– Artur Ludvik *

– Lise Ludvik * Michel Vitold – Smola *

Gabriele Ferzetti Gabriele Ferzetti (born Pasquale Ferzetti; 17 March 1925 – 2 December 2015) was an Italian actor with more than 160 credits across film, television, and stage. His career was at its peak in the 1950s and 1960s. Ferzetti's first leading role ...

– Kohoutek *

Jean Bouise Jean Bouise (3 June 1929 – 6 July 1989) was a French actor. He was born in Le Havre. In the 1950s he helped to found Théâtre de la Cité, and was a player in the company. He entered films in the 1960s, and played a supporting roles in ...

– the factory head * – Josef Pavel *

Gérard Darrieu Gérard Darrieu (1925–2004) was a French actor. Selected filmography *1950: ''Three Telegrams'' (directed by Henri Decoin) - Jeune dragueur *1951: '' Juliette, or Key of Dreams'' - Un prisonnier (uncredited) *1951: ''Boîte de nuit'' - Le g ...

– a policeman * Gilles Segal *

Henri Marteau Henri Marteau (31 March 1874 – 3 October 1934) was a French violinist and composer, who obtained Swedish citizenship in 1915. Life and career Marteau was born in Reims. He was of German and French ancestry. His father, a Frenchman, was a well k ...

* – a policeman *

Michel Beaune Michel Beaune (1933–1990) was a French actor. Filmography *1960: '' Trapped by Fear'' - Un ami de Paul (uncredited) *1961: ''Les godelureaux'' *1964: '' Backfire'' - Daniel *1970: '' The Confession'' - L'avocat *1970: '' The Time to Die'' ...

– the lawyer *

Jacques Rispal Jacques Rispal (1 August 1923 – 9 February 1986) was a French film actor. He appeared in 100 films between 1952 and 1986. Selected filmography * '' Crimson Curtain'' (1952) * ''A Man Named Rocca'' (1961) - (uncredited) * ''Five Miles to ...

Michel Robin Michel Robin (13 November 1930 – 18 November 2020) was a French film, stage, and television actor. A sociétaire of the Comédie-Française since 1996, he also appeared in 120 films from 1966 to 2018. He won several awards for his acting, ...

– the prosecutor * – Tonda * Marc Bonseignour * * * Monique Chaumette *

Marc Eyraud Marc Eyraud (1 March 1924 – 15 February 2005) was a French film actor. He appeared in 60 films between 1956 and 1995. Partial filmography * ''Plucking the Daisy'' (1956) - Un photographe (uncredited) * ''The Man in the Raincoat'' (1957) ...

* Jean-François Gobbi * * William Jacques * Guy Mairesse *

François Marthouret François Marthouret (born 12 September 1943) is a French actor. Selected filmography Theater References External links * {{DEFAULTSORT:Marthouret, Francois 1943 births Living people Male actors from Paris French male film actors ...

Umberto Raho Umberto Raho (4 June 1922 – 9 January 2016) was an Italian stage, film and television actor. Life and career Born in Bari, the son of an Italian father and a Bulgarian mother, Raho graduated in philosophy and then, immediately after the w ...

* Laszlo Szabo *

Antoine Vitez Antoine Vitez (; 20 December 1930 – 30 April 1990) was a French actor, director, and poet. He became a central character and influence on the French theater in the post-war period, especially in the technique of teaching drama. He was also tr ...

Production

Yves Montand lost more than to play his role. Montand had been shaken by the 1956 events in Hungary and later said of the film: "There was in what I inflicted upon myself or this rolesomething of an act of ''

expiation Propitiation is the act of appeasing or making well-disposed a deity, thus incurring divine favor or avoiding divine retribution. While some use the term interchangeably with expiation, others draw a sharp distinction between the two. The discus ...

''."

Reception and awards

Vincent Canby Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who served as the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in ...

in ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' in December 1970 did not consider ''The Confession'' a better film than '' Z'' (1969), but because the subject of this film "is much more complex, much more human, I find it vastly more interesting". It is "a harrowing film of intellectual and emotional anguish, dramatized by the breathless devices of melodrama." Roger Ebert wrote in April 1971: "It is not a thriller like ''Z,'' and it couldn't be, because there is no justice to emerge at the end and no scoundrels to unmask." The director, he wrote, "has made a point of insisting that the movie is anti-Stalinist, not anti-Communist." London remained a communist at the time the film was made.

Pauline Kael Pauline Kael (; June 19, 1919 – September 3, 2001) was an American film critic who wrote for ''The New Yorker'' magazine from 1968 to 1991. Known for her "witty, biting, highly opinionated and sharply focused" reviews, Kael's opinions oft ...

wrote in ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'' that the film is a "thoughtful, intelligent demonstration of how strong, idealistic men of character are turned into pawns of history". Although the film is "subdued, Costa-Gavras's work has tremendous zing, but it's not until the movie is almost over that it gains resonance."

Ronald Bergan Ronald Bergan (né Ginsberg, 2 November 1937 – 23 July 2020) was a South African-born British writer and historian. He was contributor to ''The Guardian'' (from 1989) and lecturer on film and other subjects as well as the author (or co-author) ...

and Robyn Karney in the ''Bloomsbury Foreign Film Guide'' (1988) wrote: "the screenplay's static and wordy nature is not sufficiently tempered by the direction or the playing. However, some of the interrogation scenes which lead to the false confession of the title cannot fail to have an impact." Issued as the ''Holt Foreign Film Guide'' (first ed.) and the ''Faber Companion to Foreign Films'' (second ed.) in the United States. The film was nominated for the

Golden Globes The Golden Globe Awards are accolades bestowed by the Hollywood Foreign Press Association beginning in January 1944, recognizing excellence in both American and international film and television. Beginning in 2022, there are 105 members of ...

and BAFTA Awards as Best Foreign Language Film.

References

External links

*
''The Confession: Enthralling Absurdity''
an essay by

Dina Iordanova Dina Iordanova (born 1960) is an educationalist and Professor of Film Studies at the University of St. Andrews. A specialist in world cinema, her special expertise is in the cinema of the Balkans, Eastern Europe, and Europe in general. Her research ...

at the Criterion Collection {{DEFAULTSORT:Confession, The 1970 films 1970 drama films Films directed by Costa Gavras Italian drama films Films about capital punishment Films about miscarriage of justice Drama films based on actual events Films based on non-fiction books Films set in Prague French drama films Films critical of communism Films produced by Robert Dorfmann Films scored by Giovanni Fusco Films set in Czechoslovakia Films set in 1951 Films set in 1968 1970s French-language films 1970s Italian films 1970s French films