I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Absolutely Brilliant!

A brilliant film that helped define a genre

Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Man, the Holocaust was depressing. And this movie faithfully shows real life events of Jews in France in about the most depressing way possible.The main focus is one family, and their various neighbors, who escaped Poland and came to Paris to avoid the Germans. Through the course of a pretty much hopeless two hours you follow them and a French Protestant Nurse, as they go through the various horrible things that the Germans and with compliance from the French, did to them.A lot of the other reviews are calling it a French Schindler's List. It isn't. Schindler's List is beautifully directed and acted, this is not. The direction always feels like you're watching a documentary and aren't actually feeling a lot of the things that the characters are supposed to be feeling. Then it cuts to something else completely, like backroom dealings, and you almost feel like some voice over guy says, "Meanwhile in a dark dusty room in Paris." I think the director's main goal was to try to convince you that the French government was no better than the Germans and it didn't matter if that story fit his film or not.My biggest issue with movie was actually the plot. At this point, pretty much everyone knows that the Holocaust was absolutely terrible. We see small moments of ordinary people being heroic and either hiding Jews or doing little things to help them. But then they're gone and there's no hope. Most of the other Holocaust movies focuses on a denouement of something good happening. Schindler had a list. Life is Beautiful *spoiler* ended the war. Not in this film. In this film, you knew that basically everyone was going to die since it gave the time frame of when it started. Sure a couple individuals survived. But you knew that basically all of the things that were done, would lead to the death of hundreds of characters. It just doesn't make the film that much fun to watch. It's tough to get attached to someone you know is going to die for no good reason.If you want to see a movie about Jews in occupied France, sure. If you want to be depressed for a couple hours, with almost nothing breaking it up or giving hope, then La Rafle is for you. If you want to watch a movie about the Holocaust or the plight of Jews in that time period, there are some better films that actually give you some amount of hope about the whole situation. This one just didn't focus on that, instead going through the step by step ways that people were lead to their deaths.

I never knew about the Jews who were taken out of their homes and kept in the Velodrome d'Hiver in such awful conditions. While I had some idea of the treatment of the French Jews by the Vichy government, having read some historical fact it never hit home to me in such concrete detail before. I liked the juxtaposition of the lighthearted behavior of the children with what was about to happen to them and their families very interesting. I gave it 9 stars instead of 10 because I felt that some stories were not adequately developed. I would have liked to know more about the various characters, particularly those who escaped. I would have liked to know what happened to the girl who escaped by pretending to be the plumber's wife. I would have also liked to know what happened to the other girl who was taken in by the priests, along with her baby brother. There was also no explanation about what happened to the boy who escaped with Jo. Despite these omissions, this was overall an excellent story that succeeded in breaking my heart again.

La Rafle – The Round Up – CATCH IT (B+) French holocaust movie about Vel' d'Hiv Roundup in Paris during World War II. The La Rafle is a true story about few weeks in July 1942, when more than 13,000 Parisian Jews, including more than 4000 children, were rounded up and taken to the now notorious Vel' d'Hiv stadium. All the Jews families were kept in the stadium with no food, water or proper toilets. The movie is based upon the true story of the survivals during that time, which includes the young boy "Jo Weismann" and Christian nurse "Annette Monod". La Rafle succeed in presenting the situations at the Vel' d'Hiv stadium during that time. The story of young boy Jo and his neighbors are heart wrenching. I must say that the young star Romain Di Concerto as Nono is the cutest kid in the world. All of his scenes will simply brings tears into your eyes. There is no word to describe the innocence this character brings on screen. Melanie Laurent as Annette Mondo is great, she brings the charm into her character and shows how brilliantly she can be transformed into any character provided. Raphaëlle Agogué as Jo Weismann's mother is stunning. Hugo Leverdez, Jean Reno & Denis Menochet did a fine job. La Rafle depicted the situation in French during World War II perfectly but I do find the scenes showing Hitler or French govt. taking care of the matters inconsistent or you can incoherent with the movie. I think the movie would have been better without it. Overall, La Rafle is a very effective movie about the past human accuracy in the world.

Mélanie Laurent is convincing. At the time of this review the rating averaged 6.9, so it has crept up from what it was earlier, as I can tell by reading other user reviews; I think it has a fair result considering other movies on the subject. Speaking of the subject, the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup of 1942, it is an historical fact (easy to check on Wikipedia). This movie highlights the children's fate more than the rest and the actors in those roles did a pretty good job. Because we see children being torn from their parents and being brought to be killed as they were, it is a difficult movie to watch, how can it not. Some reviewers complain about the numerous movies on the subject of the holocaust; there have been genocides before WWII and more even since, so as long as there are, there must be movies on the subject. Books and encyclopedias can relate facts etc., but motion pictures about genocides do a far better job at conveying the horror and the evil it is. Two movies were produced and released in 2010 on the Vel' d'Hiv Roundup of 1942, the other being 'Sarah's Key'; I hope as many people as possible see at least one of them, because I for one understand how movies help shape the thinking of a generation.