The Female Agents

Rating:

* * * *

Verdict:

Sassy, action-packed, French wartime thriller.

Based on a true story,

The Female Agents

is a tribute to the heroic actions of a group of female Resistance agents who worked for the Special Operations Executive (SOE) created by Winston Churchill during WWII. It centres around Louise (Marceau), a member of the French Resistance, who, soon after her husband's death is recruited by the SOE for an urgent mission to rescue a British geologist who has fallen into German hands while preparing for D-Day.

Working alongside her brother Pierre (Julien Boisselier), Louise puts together an all-female commando unit to infiltrate a Nazi hospital and rescue the geologist before he can be interrogated.

While the beginning is bogged down with detail, it settles into a good pace, adding enough twists to keep us guessing.

The story is told with a sense of the melodramatic rather than chilling reality - but it doesn't spare the violence that went with the territory.

While it has its fanciful moments, the film still makes a serious statement of how incredibly valuable and courageous these women were.

Francesca Rudkin

Cast:

Sophie Marceau, Julie Depardieu

Director:

Jean-Paul Salome

Running time:

114 mins

Rating:

R16 (violence)

Screening:

Rialto