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There is an obvious, if not entirely accurate, parallel between An Officer and a Spy and the life of its creator, Roman Polanski. Known in France as J’Accuse, the film tells the story of French captain Alfred Dreyfus, who was wrongly convicted of treason in 1894. (Dreyfus was Jewish, and anti-Semitic prejudice played a significant role in his false accusation of passing military secrets to Germany.) Polanski famously pleaded guilty to having unlawful sex with a minor while working in Hollywood in 1977 and soon after fled to France, which does not extradite its citizens, where he has lived ever since. All of this seems to be expected. But the film’s deeper connections to Polanski’s personal situation are less obvious, though far more rooted in the aesthetic that defines his directorial style.
The film, co-written by Polanski and British writer Robert Harris (based on his 2013 novel), begins not with Dreyfus’s arrest or conviction, but with his discharge ceremony in the courtyard of the École Militaire in Paris. As his uniform is stripped of its insignia and his sword is broken, Dreyfus (played by Louis Garrel) loudly proclaims his innocence to both his comrades and the crowd outside the gates. The drama, though rooted in personal prejudice and official misconduct, centers on the damage to reputation, the notion of undeserved tarnishings, and the victim’s quest to restore his good name—and his place in the army he loves.
In Polanski's film, Dreyfus becomes a supporting character in his own story. The protagonist is Georges Picquart (Jean Dujardin), an officer whose investigations ultimately help exonerate Dreyfus, though he has little sympathy for him. Picquart was one of Dreyfus's teachers at the academy; in a flashback, Dreyfus challenges Picquart's low grade, accusing him of anti-Semitism. Picquart denies this, but makes an anti-Semitic remark during his resignation. The following year, Picquart is promoted to lieutenant colonel and appointed chief of army intelligence. In his new position, he examines a key piece of evidence, the infamous “bordereau,” a letter that reveals German access to French military information, and begins to doubt Dreyfus's guilt, suspecting another officer, Ferdinand Walsin Esterhazy (Laurent Natrella), of writing it. Picquart reopens the investigation and seeks a retrial, coming into conflict with his superiors and a disloyal, anti-Semitic subordinate (Gregory Gadebois), which ultimately jeopardizes his military career in the fight for justice.
That Polanski finds parallels to Dreyfus in his own cinema may be distasteful, but the comparison permeates his film, perhaps not immediately, but at least early on. He began planning the film with Harris in 2012 and intended to begin shooting that same year, noting “the absolute relevance of the case in the context of the modern world” (mentioning things like “security paranoia” and “an aggressive press,” without directly identifying himself). In 2013, when the film was still in development, he specifically linked its theme – “the stubbornness with which the media, like the army of that time or any state institution, refuses to admit a mistake” – to situations in which, as he puts it, “a newspaper or a magazine is wrong about me or publishes something that is not true.”
In any case, Polanski’s claims aside, An Officer and a Spy offers an important parallel, one that goes beyond simple legal guilt or innocence to notions of honor, personal contempt, and professional rejection. By the time Polanski began filming in November 2018, everything had changed for him in France. In early 2017, after he was chosen to host France’s César Awards (the Oscars’ equivalent), the backlash from French feminists was so immediate and furious that he declined the invitation. In October, the journalist Sandra Müller launched the #BalanceTonPorc (condemn your pig) movement, the French equivalent of #MeToo. Later that month, a retrospective of Polanski’s films at the Cinémathèque Française also sparked protests; when he appeared in the audience, two members of the feminist group Femen interrupted the event to denounce his presence.
It is impossible to determine exactly whether the script of An Officer and a Spy has changed over time. But of course, direction depends largely not only on the text of the script, but also on how it is realized on the screen – on the tone, the accents, the tempo, the rhythm of the editing. The main theme of the film, even its dramatic framework, is the difference between private and public life, and the profound disturbance that results from the intersection of these
Sourse: newyorker.com
