Female Agents (15)

6:26pm Thursday 26th June 2008

IT'S spring 1944 and the eve of the Normandy landings. The Germans are aware that an invasion is imminent and capturing a British agent gives them the chance to extract information about the Allies plan. Enter French Resistance agent Louise (Sophie Marceau).. She and her female agents must go to France and rescue the captured agent before he's tortured into giving the game away.

It's Carve Her Name With Pride crossed with elements of The Dirty Dozen and Black Book, a curiously old-fashioned (and none the worse for that) wartime drama of heroics and sacrifice.

The all-female team are a motley bunch - seductive showgirl Suze (Marie Gillain), explosive expert Gaelle (Deborah Francois) and prostitute Jeanne (Julie Depardieu). On French soil, they're aided by Maria (Maya Sansa), a Jewish-Italian radio operator.

Hardly the "five ordinary women, destined to become heroines"

described in the production notes.

Their virtual suicide mission means going to Paris to kill the colonel who's head of Nazi counterintelligence (Moritz Bleibtreu) and rescue a British geologist recovering in a French hospital.

This is all done, under Jean-Paul Salome'' direction, with an good degree of conviction and excitement with bursts of action punctuating all the skulking around and torture scenes.

Stars: Sophie Marceau, Julie Depardieu, Marie Gillan, Deborah Francois, Maya Sansa, Moritz Bleibtreu
Running time: 120 mins
Rating: Four stars