This series has been selected by the celebrated director and committed scholar Bertrand Tavernier, whose own 2002 film Safe Conduct pays tribute to French filmmakers who, during the German occupation of their country, managed to make films of political and artistic integrity. In his introduction to the series, Tavernier describes the setting for filmgoers and filmmakers after 1940:
France had just suffered a major setback and unprecedented humiliation; a large part of its ruling class-its political leaders, its elite, and its intellectuals-resorted to cowardice and flattery to find favor with the German occupying forces. France was flooded by propaganda. You can imagine the shock people felt when they suddenly saw a film that was intelligent, demanding, intellectually ambitious, and which also rejected any compromise. They must have instinctively and subconsciously understood that the people who made this film had not surrendered. Many filmgoers described the pride they felt after they had seen Douce, Goupi Mains Rouges, Le Corbeau, and Children of Paradise. Such films rekindled hope and gave one the will to resist.
In order to avoid becoming apologists for either the Vichy regime or Collaboration, some directors turned to fantastic or historical films. These genres served as ruses, enabling them to sneak in critical undertones or dialogue with double meanings, which the audience deciphered perfectly well. Thus these films are full of pleasant surprises. But despite an impressive list of directors who made their debuts in that period, it would be a lie to claim that this was the Golden Age of French cinema, as many journalists and film directors have in the past. Indeed, how could we forget that anti-Semitism drove many Jewish authors to silence or exile; and the deportations, the censorship, or the deaths of artists?
Bertrand Tavernier, 2004