''Les Misérables'' is a 1995 French

war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about navy, naval, air force, air, or army, land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle s ...

written, produced and directed by

Claude Lelouch Claude Barruck Joseph Lelouch (; born 30 October 1937) is a French film director, writer, cinematographer, actor and producer. Lelouch grew up in an Algerian Jewish family. He emerged as a prominent director in the 1960s. Lelouch gained critical ...

. Set in France during the first half of the 20th century, the film concerns a poor and illiterate man named Henri Fortin (

Jean-Paul Belmondo Jean-Paul Charles Belmondo (; 9 April 19336 September 2021) was a French actor. Initially associated with the New Wave of the 1960s, he was a major French film star for several decades from the 1960s onward, frequently portraying police officer ...

) who is introduced to

Victor Hugo Victor-Marie Hugo, vicomte Hugo (; 26 February 1802 – 22 May 1885) was a French Romanticism, Romantic author, poet, essayist, playwright, journalist, human rights activist and politician. His most famous works are the novels ''The Hunchbac ...

's classic 1862 novel ''

Les Misérables ''Les Misérables'' (, ) is a 19th-century French literature, French Epic (genre), epic historical fiction, historical novel by Victor Hugo, first published on 31 March 1862, that is considered one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. '' ...

'' and begins to see parallels to his own life. The film won the 1995

Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film The Golden Globe Award for Best Foreign Language Film is a Golden Globe Award presented by Dick Clark Productions to reward theatrically-released feature film not in the English language. It was first introduced at the 7th Golden Globe Awards f ...

Plot

As the film opens, Henri's father, a chauffeur also named Henri, is falsely accused of having murdered his boss. During his trial and imprisonment, Henri's mother finds a job in a tavern on a Normandy beach. There Henri sees a film adaptation of ''Les Misérables''. His father dies attempting to escape from prison, and upon hearing the news Henri's mother commits suicide. Henri grows up an orphan and learns boxing. The film next takes up the story of Elisa, a ballerina, and André Ziman, a young Jewish journalist and law student. They meet following a performance of a ballet based on ''Les Misérables''. Later, during World War II, André and Elisa, now married, and their daughter Salomé attempt to cross the Swiss border to escape the Nazis. They encounter Henri, who owns a moving company, and they discuss the Hugo novel. The Zimans entrust Salomé to Henri and enroll her in a Catholic convent school. André and Elisa are ambushed while trying to cross the frontier. Elisa is arrested and André wounded. Farmers who find him give him shelter. The members of a local gang and Henri join the French Resistance, but the gang members take advantage of their anti-Nazi attacks to steal from local houses. Elisa and other women are forced to entertain the Nazi occupiers. She is sent to a concentration camp for being defiant. After staging an attack on a train transporting funds for the

Vichy government Vichy France (; 10 July 1940 – 9 August 1944), officially the French State ('), was a French rump state headed by Marshal Philippe Pétain during World War II, established as a result of the French capitulation after the defeat against ...

, Henri and his mates travel to Normandy to visit the tavern where he lived as a child. The

D-Day The Normandy landings were the landing operations and associated airborne operations on 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during the Second World War. Codenamed Operation Neptune and often referred to as ...

invasion is launched the next day and Henri supports the Allied forces when they conquer the beach. In the process he saves the life of the tavern owner's son Marius. At the war's end, Henri accepts an offer to run a seaside camp in Normandy. There he receives a letter from Salomé, who has no way of contacting her family. He takes her with him to the resort, which he names Chez Jean Valjean. Elisa, having survived a Nazi concentration camp in German-occupied Poland, joins them later. A former Vichy police agent accuses Henri of abetting the gang's activities during the war and of robbing and burning a train. He is imprisoned to await trial. Meanwhile André's one-time rescuer is holding him captive, hoping to live off his bank account. The farmer has told André that the American D-Day invasion failed and the Nazis now rule the world. With evident reluctance, the farmer's wife supports her husband in these lies until he attempts to poison André. Then she shoots her husband before he can feed André the poisoned soup. As she checks to see if her husband is dead, he grabs her and chokes her to death. André escapes from his cellar prison on a bad leg and emerges to find the farmer couple dead and a liberated Europe. He rejoins his wife and daughter at Chez Jean Valjean and then represents Henri at his trial and wins his acquittal. As the film ends, Henri, now the mayor, presides at the civil marriage of Salomé and Marius in the presence of André and Elisa and the mother superior of the school that sheltered Salomé. André Ziman quotes Victor Hugo: "The best of our lives is yet to come."

Cast

as Leopold/Henri Fortin/Henri's father (also named Henri Fortin) *

Michel Boujenah Michel Boujenah (born 3 November 1952) is a French-Tunisian Jewish actor, comedian, film director, and screenwriter. Life and career Michel Boujenah was born on 3 November 1952 in Tunis, Tunisia. He is the brother of Paul Boujenah, a film dir ...

as André Ziman *

Alessandra Martines Alessandra Martines (born 19 September 1963) is an Italian French dancer and actress mainly working in the English-, French-, and Italian-speaking worlds. She started young in ballet on opera stages in Switzerland, France, the United States and ...

as Elisa Ziman *

Salomé Lelouch Salome (c. early 1st century AD) was the daughter of Herodias, and nemesis of John the Baptist (Mark 6:17–29 and Matthew 14:3–11). Salome or Salomé may also refer to: People with the mononym * Salome Alexandra (139–67 BC), Queen regnant ...

as Salomé Ziman, child * Margot Abascal as Salomé Ziman, adult *

Annie Girardot Annie Suzanne Girardot (25 October 193128 February 2011) was a French actress. She often played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often lonely women, imbuing her characters with an earthiness and reality that endeared her to women un ...

as Madame Thénardier *

Philippe Léotard Philippe Léotard (his full name was Ange Philippe Paul André Léotard-Tomasi; 28 August 1940 – 25 August 2001) was a French actor, poet and singer. Biography He was born in Nice, one of seven children - four girls, then three boys, of whi ...

as Thénardier *

Clémentine Célarié Clémentine Célarié (born 12 October 1957) is a French actress, writer, director and singer.

as Catherine *

Philippe Khorsand Philippe Khorsand (February 17, 1948 – January 29, 2008) was a French actor. His father was Iranian and his mother was French. He first appeared in a number of small roles in the 1970s. One of his most memorable roles as husband and father in ' ...

as Policeman *

Ticky Holgado Ticky Holgado (24 June 1944 – 22 January 2004), pseudonym of Joseph Holgado, was a French actor and a frequent collaborator with filmmaker Jean-Pierre Jeunet. With ''Delicatessen'' (1991) by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro, Ticky Holgado saw ...

as Nice Street Urchin * William Leymergie as Toureiffel *

Jean Marais Jean-Alfred Villain-Marais (11 December 1913 – 8 November 1998), known professionally as Jean Marais (), was a French actor, film director, theatre director, painter, sculptor, visual artist, writer and photographer. He performed in over 100 f ...

as Msgr. Myriel *

Micheline Presle Micheline Presle (; born Micheline Nicole Julia Émilienne Chassagne; 22 August 1922 – 21 February 2024) was a French actress. She was sometimes billed as Micheline Prelle. Starting her career in 1937, she starred or appeared in over 150 films ...

as Mother Superior *

Sylvie Joly Sylvie Joly (18 October 1934 – 4 September 2015) was a French actress and comedian. She was best known for her roles in the films '' Going Places'' (1974) and '' Get Out Your Handkerchiefs'' (1978). Personal life Joly was born in Paris. Sh ...

as the Innkeeper * Daniel Toscan du Plantier as Count de Villeneuve *

Michaël Cohen Michaël Cohen (born 13 December 1970) is a French actor. He appeared in more than fifty films since 1991. Selected filmography 1998 La dame aux camélias Armand Duval References External links * 1970 births Living people French ...

as Marius * Jacques Boudet as Doctor * Isabelle Sadoyan as Madame Magloire *

Robert Hossein Robert Hossein (30 December 1927 – 31 December 2020) was a French film actor, director, and writer. He directed Les Misérables (1982 film), the 1982 adaptation of ''Les Misérables'' and appeared in ''Vice and Virtue'', ''Le Casse'', ''Les U ...

as Ceremony Master *

Darry Cowl Darry Cowl (born André Darricau; 27 August 1925 – 14 February 2006) was a French comedian, actor and musician. He won a César Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role in 2004 for his role as a concierge in '' Pas sur la bouche'' (''Not on ...

as Bookseller *

Antoine Duléry Antoine Duléry (born 14 November 1959 in Paris) is a French actor An actor (masculine/gender-neutral), or actress (feminine), is a person who portrays a character in a production. The actor performs "in the flesh" in the traditional medi ...

as Crazy Street Urchin * Jacques Gamblin as Church Attendant *

Joseph Malerba Joseph Malerba (born 5 October 1962) is a French actor known for his role as police detective Walter Morlighem in the French TV series ''Braquo ''Braquo'' is a French crime drama television series created by Olivier Marchal. It was produced ...

as The pumpman *

Pierre Vernier Pierre Vernier (; 19 August 1580 at Ornans, Franche-Comté (at that time ruled by the Spanish Habsburgs, now part of France) – 14 September 1637, same location) was a mathematician and instrument inventor. He was the inventor and eponym o ...

as Prison Director *

Nicolas Vogel Nicolas Vogel (born in Paris, France, May 27, 1925 - died in Paris September 17, 2006) was an actor and comedian who was featured in numerous films and television shows in the 1960s and 1970s, including '' The Man from Chicago'' (1963), '' Le Gitan ...

as Le général de Verdun ;In the film within the film * Jean-Paul Belmondo as Jean Valjean *

Rufus Rufus is a masculine given name, a surname, an Ancient Roman cognomen and a nickname (from Latin ''wikt:rufus, rufus'', "red"). Notable people with the name include: Given name Politicians * Marcus Caelius Rufus, (28 May 82 BC – after 48 ...

as Monsieur Thénardier *

Nicole Croisille Nicole Croisille (9 October 1936 – 4 June 2025) was a French singer and actress. She appeared in 24 films between 1961 and 2005, and recorded several albums since 1961. Perhaps her most heard work is on the soundtrack of 1966 film, '' A Man a ...

as Mme. Thénardier * Clémentine Célarié as Fantine * Philippe Khorsand as Javert

Reception

The film opened at number one at the French box office with a gross of 8,510,740 Francs ($1.7 million) for the week. The film received positive reviews from critics with a score of 80% on

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...

Roger Ebert Roger Joseph Ebert ( ; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American Film criticism, film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter and author. He wrote for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. Eber ...

wrote he liked this film's "expansive freedom and (the) energy of its storytelling". ''

The Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper in the U.S. and the larges ...

'' called it "a spectacular-looking film" that "eventually becomes needlessly drawn-out", and added: "the cast is staunch...but Belmondo...easily walks away with the picture." ''Variety'' said it was the "mightiest of Lelouch’s humanist hymns", and Belmondo "gives one of the finest perfs of his career". Janet Maslin, who reviewed the film for ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'', meanwhile complained about "odd variations on Hugo's themes."

Accolades

The film won the 1995

and Annie Girardot won the 1996

César Award for Best Supporting Actress The César Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role (French: ''César de la meilleure actrice dans un second rôle'') is one of the César Awards, presented annually by the ''Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma'' to recognize the outst ...

References

External links