Gay persecution in the spotlight in French wartime drama

If we can accept the movies as a reliable gauge, every single person in occupied Paris had a secret.

Of course, most weren't Jewish or homosexual, collaborators or Resistance members. But nobody bothers to make movies about those ordinary civilians, and with good reason.

Which brings us to "A Love to Hide" ("Un Amour à Taire"), a well-mounted wartime melodrama packed to the rafters with incident and intrigue. This French saga of camaraderie, betrayal, suffering and posthumous dignity doesn't break any new narrative ground, although it is irresistibly compelling, and its focus on a gay couple is fresh and illuminating.

"A Love to Hide" screens Monday, June 19 and Sunday, June 25 in frameline30, the San Francisco International LGBT Film Festival.

The film opens on a distraught young woman hiding in a doorway outside a laundry in 1942, hoping to glimpse the only person she knows in Paris. Sara is an Alsatian Jew, and her family was murdered by the trafficker they paid to smuggle them to safety.

She'd met Jean a long time ago on a family vacation, and through their letters she developed a thing for him. So after Jean spots her on the street and takes her to his friend Philippe's apartment, she's stunned to discover that Jean has a thing for guys.

Jean gets Sara a job in his father's laundry, where she pretends to be a non-Jew named Yvonne. Once Philippe gets over his jealousy and distrust, the three become best friends and life takes on a veneer of normalcy. It is only a veneer, though, for given the nature of their secrets they have no margin for mistakes or indiscretions.

The wild card in this delicate set-up is Jean's brother Jacques, an opportunistic crook who passes along the addresses of Jews who haven't picked up their laundry to a nasty specimen up the criminal food chain. Jacques once had an unrequited crush on Sara, and her reappearance ignites his ardor. Alas, she's no more responsive this time, and her rejection — combined with his discovery of Jean's homosexuality — drives a furious Jacques to a petty act of revenge that sets in motion a series of grievously destructive events.

"A Love to Hide" offers flashes of courage and integrity, with Jean, Philippe and Sara demonstrating their heroism in any number of ways. But we know from director Christian Faure's continual depiction of the skeins of corruption in French society that the odds of good triumphing are awfully slim.

Ultimately, the most enigmatic figure is Sara/Yvonne. She is a central character, and yet emotionally she's often on the fringes. While her presence is the catalyst for several major shifts in the narrative, she's rarely the one actually taking action.

That makes sense, for "A Love to Hide" is really Jean's story. We gradually discern that the film's raison d'etre is to expose the level of suffering that the Nazis and their helpers meted out to homosexuals — and the French government's failure to acknowledge that persecution until relatively recently.

"A Love to Hide" has a lot more on its mind than most melodramas, and serves as notice that French filmmakers have not finished plumbing their country's murky history.




"A Love to Hide" screens at 9:15 p.m. Monday, June 19 at the Parkway Theatre, 1834 Park Blvd., Oakland, and 4:45 p.m. Sunday, June 25 at the Castro Theatre, 429 Castro St., S.F. Tickets: $6-$10 at www.frameline.org, (925) 866-9559 or Superstar Satellite, 474 Castro St., S.F.