By Ian Kane
In the quiet aftermath of carnage, grief doesn’t simply fade; it simmers beneath the surface. The broody 2016 drama “Frantz” begins not with the roar of battle but with the fragile silence left behind, a space where secrets, sorrow, and guilt swirl like smoke.
The story is set in a battered post-World War I Europe struggling to recover. French director François Ozon’s take on Maurice Rostand’s 1925 play, “The Man I Killed” (“L’homme que j’ai tue,”) brings more than lost souls back to life. Instead, it exposes the deep emotional scars war leaves on people, not just countries.
What starts as a woman’s simple visit to a soldier’s grave soon twists into something more unsettling. A strange foreigner appears to mourn but seems out of place. As his story unfolds, the film turns away from history and toward the fragile stories the characters weave to survive heartbreak.
Anna (Paula Beer) watches stranger Adrien (Pierre Niney) from afar, in “Frantz” GJW+
“Frantz” draws from Ernst Lubitsch’s “Broken Lullaby” (1932). This film adapted Rostand’s play about a French soldier seeking forgiveness from the family of a German soldier he killed in WWI.
Ozon’s film uses that premise as a stepping stone. It quickly veers off into its own path, revealing a darker, sorrow-filled story that mixes truth and deception in search of meaning and redemption.
Filmed mostly in pale black-and-white, flickering into color like half-remembered dreams, “Frantz” isn’t about clear truths. It’s about the ache of uncertainty and the tenuous tales we create to give grief a shape we can bear.
A Stranger’s Flowers
Anna (Paula Beer) lives with her grieving parents in a small German town still scarred by the conflict. In the aftermath of WWI, Anna mourns her fallen fiancé. Her life is quiet and steeped in ritual; she visits his grave regularly, though his body was never recovered.
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One day, she notices unfamiliar flowers resting on the grave. Soon after, she encounters Adrien (Pierre Niney), a soft-spoken Frenchman whose presence as a former enemy soldier stirs unease among the townspeople.
Adrien (Pierre Niney) and Anna (Paula Beer), in “Frantz.” GJW+
Adrien claims to have known Frantz before the war and begins sharing stories of their friendship in Paris. He speaks of their visits to the Louvre, long talks, and a shared love of art and music.
His gentle demeanor slowly disarms Frantz’s parents, even as some in the town remain suspicious of his motives. Anna, caught between curiosity and caution, finds herself drawn to Adrien. She senses that he, too, carries invisible wounds. The black-and-white palette occasionally gives way to color during these moments of remembered joy, mixing past and present, grief and healing.
As Adrien prepares to return to France, Anna is left with questions she can’t ignore. Her journey to Paris becomes a search not only for Adrien, but for answers about who Frantz truly was, and who Adrien is behind his quiet sorrow.
Love’s Shadow Play
One of the rare, full-color scenes with Adrien (Pierre Niney), and Anna (Paula Beer), in “Frantz.” GJW+
The film begins with muted, painful restraint as director Ozon crafts a world weighed down by lingering sorrow. Here, mourning is a steady, unspoken presence. Anna carries her grief with quiet dignity. The arrival of the Frenchman, whose haunted eyes and unsettled story, changes the film’s tone and focus. Much of the film rests on illusion—of identity, of memory, and of what people need from the past to survive the present.
There’s a taste of something profound here, but it stays just out of reach. Moments linger, but the structure often falters. What begins as a mystery of loss gradually turns into a reflection on storytelling itself, and what we’re willing to invent to soothe what hurts.
“Frantz” feels like a glass music box, fragile, elegant, spinning something lovely but too measured. The emotional spell it casts early on grows faint as it searches for meaning it never quite earns.
Beer holds the camera with grace, and Niney carries his character’s secrets like they’re stitched into his coat. But the film’s pulse slows just when it should stir.
There’s something admirable in its moodiness, but the story doesn’t leave you wrecked or contemplative. Instead, it leaves you wondering what might’ve happened if it stopped hiding behind its own reflection.
Although worth a watch, it never quite breaks through, like a pleasant song played too softly, leaving you craving a stronger chord.
“Frantz” is available on GJW+.
‘Frantz’ Director: François Ozon Starring: Pierre Niney, Paula Beer, Ernst Stötzner MPAA Rating: PG-13 Running Time: 1 hour, 53 minutes Release Date: March 15, 2017 Rated: 3 stars out of 5
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