Lucien begins the film as a janitor at a nursing home. But such work is tedious, so he returns to his family farm. However, with his father in a German prison, his mother (Gilberte Rivet) has taken a lover who unsurprisingly dislikes the unpredictable and disaffected son. Lucien must leave home permanently and find a position.
Lucien first approaches a local Resistance leader, who sizes up Lucien quickly, and wants nothing to do with him. The naive and indifferent Lucien wanders the village after curfew, and is arrested by local Vichy police, ruthless collaborators with the Nazi occupiers.
They find Lucien obliging. He gives up the Resistance leader, and thanks to his experience at hunting rabbits, is a crack shot. That, plus his amoral and fearless nature, leads to employment as a gun thug with the pro-Nazi French police. They occupy a posh hotel, and are a cynical and motley crew of hard drinking men. Women are also there, as secretaries and servants.
Lucien's country attire is inappropriate for his new position, so he is introduced to Albert (Holger Löwenadler), a well-to-do Jewish tailor in peril of getting shipped to a concentration camp. Albert has a mute elderly mother (Bella Horn) obsessed with the card game Solitaire, and a beautiful grown daughter (Aurore Clément) who spends her days playing the family piano.
Lucien falls for the daughter, and uses his police position to force his way into a relationship with her. Albert, who guards his daughter zealously, is unhappy but helpless. The daughter rejects her Jewish heritage and has strong mixed feelings for Lucien.
Meanwhile, D-Day has occurred, and the Allies are overrunning occupied France. Lucien's fellow collaborators are murdered by the Resistance. Lucien kidnaps the daughter and her grandmother and takes them deep into the country, where they might just escape both the occupiers and Resistance fighters.
How others will see it. Although Lacombe, Lucien fared well at the box office, French audiences were unsure what to make of the movie. Many films had portrayed heroes of the Resistance, but collaborators had previously existed onscreen strictly as foils for the heroes.
Other nations found it easier to be objective, and praised it. BAFTA gave it Best Film, its highest honor, ahead of the clearly superior Chinatown. The movie also received an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Language Film.
Today at imdb.con, there are only 3425 user votes but they are consistent high (7.7 out of 10) among all demographics. Viewers appreciate the depth of character, the moment of depicted history, and the novel qualities of the antihero lead. It's difficult to find anyone willing to criticize either the film or its highly regarded director.
How I felt about it. The most obvious criticism is the age of the actor playing Albert. He is at least 15 years older than his character. It must be admitted, though, that he gives a memorable performance, which explains why he was nominated as Best Supporting Actor by two U.S.A. film societies (France's César Awards did not launch until the next year).
When the hotel is taken by the Resistance, it seems odd that they do not search it, room by room, and find Lucien. We also wonder about the hotel's inexhaustible supply of liquor during wartime, and why they give new addition Lucien such freedom to consort with a Jewish family.
It seems out of place for the careful Albert to appear at the hotel, a foolish act of defiance against Lucien, especially when he might still retain some influence over his daughter.
Lucien's character is also full of inconsistencies. He takes sadistically pleasure in killing birds and rabbits, yet expresses sorrow at the death of his family's horse. Likewise, he shows indifference to the fate of captured and tortured Resistance heroes, but is willing to murder and desert to save his lover.
He seems to be symbolic, indicative of both the positive and negative aspects of Frenchmen during the occupation. At first he is passive, then a collaborator, and finally, a hero, when he shoots the German soldier and steals his auto.
It is telling that Albert's daughter is named France. She puts up little resistance to Lucien. Arguably, she loves him, and perhaps also hates him. She wants to pass as Christian, thus as French, and return to her pleasant lost life in Paris. She also wants to protect Albert and her grandmother, whom she sees as even more vulnerable than herself.