MovieChat Forums > Suite Française (2015) Discussion > I DID NOT LIKE the character of Benoit L...

I DID NOT LIKE the character of Benoit Labarie at all

posted 9 years ago by jinmo2010
9 replies | jump to latest

On account of this one guy no less than four people died: Among them one German officer and two enlisted man as well as a Frenchman who happens to be the town mayor and a viscount no less. He must have known that it's the Germans' practice to take and shoot hostages unless the perpetrator turns himself in. Why didn't he turn himself in? After all he was the one who started the whole thing by stealing the mayor's chicken and menacing his wife when she caught him in the act. He was the one who did not turn in firearm when everyone else in the town did--endangering the whole townspeople by association in case the gun was ever to be used against one of more of the Germans (which is indeed what happened).

The German officer fancying his wife?--Well, so what! Was it so much of a 'war crime' to be killed on account of? He did not even rape her, which he could have done and got away with very easily !!!!!

This guy used the people around him (including the female and male protagonists) and not only did nothing in return for them but even screwed up their life. What a selfish ***hole. Is "Benoit" a Jewish name, by the way? (I do know 'Saul' is a Jewish name, though.)

[–] Patience00 9 years ago

I didn't like him either. I think he would have thrown his wife and children in front of gunfire if it would have saved his own hide.

[–] jinmo2010 9 years ago

Patience,
I am glad out there someone shares. Actually my hunch is the guy who wrote the script was testing the limit of humanity's emotional intelligence. The Benoit Labarie character did sorely test my patience to watch the movie to the end...!

[–] ellen-38627 8 years ago

Benoit is not a Jewish name; in English, it becomes 'Benedict'. As for not turning in his gun, as the mayor himself tells his wife, everyone kept at least one firearm, himself included. I felt it was the mayor's wife's fault. She insisted on her husband informing the Germans. All that for a chicken and also, because Madame la Vicomtesse (her husband is a "Vicomte", a nobleman) was probably upset at being robbed by some pauper who she felt was way below her in social standing. Also Benoit probably felt justified in stealing from collaborators.
As for the wife not being raped, i doubt she would have been. My grandmother was a teenager during the war and she experienced the exodus, the occupation and the liberation. She always told me that young (non Jewish) girls and women were a lot safer under German occupation than under American liberation, as the Germans were far better disciplined.

[–] jinmo2010 8 years ago

You say "I [you] felt it was the mayor's wife's fault." Well, really??? This benoit guy physically threanted her. Remember it was a big male threatening a small woman in the middle of night caught in the act of stealing her property. He was mean enough to turn a simple theft into robbery. Wouldn't you take umbrage yourself in such situation? If he felt "justified in stealing from a collaborator," then what is it that makes him feel morally superior as a 'non-collaborator'? As for the issue of rape, I was not talking about the probability of his wife getting raped; I was talking about the ease with which the german could have done and got away with it. (I do know Germans had behaved far more decently than the Americans in that department.) I say this 'benedicted' Frenchman is a through and through human garbage.

[–] ellen-38627 8 years ago

"Human garbage" is an exaggeration, surely. He is a poor, disabled, tenant farmer trying to feed his family. So he steals a chicken, not from another poor tenant farmer, but from the richest family in town. True, he threatens the woman, but i don't think he would have actually hurt her. As he tells her, he isn't the only one stealing from her; he just got caught in the act. In the end of course, he lets the mayor get shot, his wife get beaten up and abandons his family as he joins the resistance in Paris. So he isn't exactly my favorite character.
As for the German officer, he is obviously a sleazy little creep who is thoroughly enjoying his power trip as the victor in a conquered land. He might have gotten away with rape, but maybe not so easily. After all, a fellow officer warns him, so he knows he is being watched and there would be consequences (perhaps a demotion or something). You don't get a highly disciplined army without punishments. And remember that the French were not seen as a subhuman species like the Slavs, Jews, Roma etc. so the German army was under strict orders to treat them better.

[–] sonnythefat 8 years ago

You forgot the Jewish woman and one of her children ?

[–] CobblersAwls 8 years ago

The one person at fault for all those deaths that resulted from Benoit being sought was the Viscountess HERSELF.

SHE was responsible. She haughtily got upset at that argument, where Benoit said just you wait until after the war, etc. He never pointed the gun at her or anything. Yes, he was angry; and was saying yeah, just you wait--you collaborating witch--entertaining the Germans at high table, drinking with them, essentially collaborating.

I wouldn't want to be HER if she's still alive the day the war ends. Anybody who's seen "A French Village" and other WWII dramas know what happened to hated French people who were seen to collaborate; So we know what will happen to her at war's end at the hands of her own people.

She went running to hubby and told him; then they hubby took it lightly and said oh never mind; remember how she doubled down and looked at him with a fake look and pretended to be scared and said he's threatened her with a gun?

She wanted Benoit to PAY for talking back to her uppity, titled self! It was mostly revenge on her part. She was still clinging to the pre-war class system and wanted him punished.

The Viscount reporting that up the line started the whole tragic line of deaths, after that!

That's the irony that was written into the film--SHE insisted on Benoit being punished for petty reasons of haughtiness that he talked back to her, and she herself then put in motion her husband being shot!

Irony with a capital I that one.

[–] Drmccormack (743) 7 years ago

I think you're right. The Vicomptess is responsible for setting the entire situation in play. Starting with the part where she had the officer moved to Benoit's farm. The officer was not honorable and neither was the Vicomtesse. In fact, judging by the letters from the townspeople, many were cowards and small minded. I liked that they included this in the movie because it shows you an uglier side to human nature in the war. They mostly show acts of bravery or nobility in a war movie, but of course, there's this side too.

[–] makdog65 (75) 7 years ago

You brought up good points. Benoit should have turned himself in, if for no other reason to save his wife from being tortured.

Parts of the movie were implausible...Madeline being allowed to visit Lucille right after her husband killed a German officer...that Lucille would think she could make it to Paris with Benoit in the trunk...the MIL leaving Lucille alone in the house with Bruno...the Germans didn't occupy the house the MIL rented out to the Jewish mother and daughter.

I still enjoyed it though.