This movie begins promisingly with a montage of images (during the titles) that squarely establishes the ideal of highlighting the role women played in WW2. Lets be frank, the defeat of Hitler depended on armies of women mostly on the "Home Front": in factories, on farms, as pilots ferrying aircraft, working in all the roles previously reserved for men, apart from the merchant navy, mining and, barring a few exceptions, combat.This film of course takes the "glamorous" option of concentrating on those exceptions. Exceptional people did extraordinary things during that war and they deserve every admiration, especially as they could receive no acknowledgement at the time. The women who in real life were infiltrated into NAZI occupied territory deserve their story be told. Unfortunately this film doesn't do that. Instead its a complete fiction.The entire scenario is hogwash. If a reconnaissance operative had been caught as is the central plot driver, the standard procedure would have been to kill him to protect secrecy, not send over a whole team including a man who knows all the secrets that needed protecting and thereby jeopardising the very secrets that the mission was to protect. The likeliest course of action at the time was to bomb the hospital into oblivion killing everyone and thereby protecting those secrets. Only an idiot would have put together the cock-a-mamie enterprise depicted. To ensure a hospitalised agents death would have required only one assassin timed to precede the bombing and willing to die if necessary in the process. Not a team of five.What is worse is the tendency that seems increasingly prevalent in French movies of inserting gratuitous and tasteless scenes of a sexually provocative nature that do nothing to advance the story, are entirely unnecessary and, in this context, rather sick. The worst here being the perverse sexualisation of a woman of necessity taking her own life, turned into a kind of sick striptease for no audience but the viewer, overladen with a corrupted form of specious religious overtones that only cheapen the act and border upon blasphemy. It may not matter to non-believers, but as the victim was depicted as devout, that seems more of an abuse and an insult than a gesture of respect.Compounding these deficiencies is the blurring together of a real project and fictitious characters, their names borrowed from real people who had nothing to do with it. The Oberst Karl Heinrich shown here never existed but the real life Karl Heindrich was actually one of the plotters who attempted to kill Hitler, not prevent the Allied invasion.Then the project herself is abused and misrepresented. It wasn't called "Phoenix" but "Mulberry" (which I had lectured into me throughout my childhood by a man who had actually worked on it). It was so secret that Grman officers never had suspicions of its relevance to D Day. Those sent to study Normandy beaches (such as the Geologist in the movie) would have had no knowledge of the project, only the task of examining the suitability of shorelines for landings. Mulberry was not even related to that, the caissons only being taken over four days after the invasion. The project was indeed critical to the invasion however, permitting the creation of a logistic supply line. However, contrary to the impression given at the close of the movie, the Americans had little to do with this. Of the two harbours created, the British one was used to great success whilst the American one was misused, not supported by US leadership, allowed to fall apart and was swiftly abandoned. The project was British, not American, yet it is presented otherwise in this movie.Altogether, the movie is a disservice to the truth and a dishonourable reflection on the real life heroines of WW2. I nonetheless give it a "5" because, in spite of this, it cannot be denied that it is very well made and gripping entertainment. It could have been so much better, especially had the final dedication been to the real female agent who was the inspiration for the story, as opposed to one of the fictitious characters depicted.

"Female Agents" from 2007 is the true story of Lise Villameur (here Louise Desfontaines, played by Sophie Marceau), an agent who worked against the Nazis during World War II. There are several films about female World War II spies: Carve Her Name with Pride is one, also a true story and very moving, and the film Odette, also very good.Desfontaines is recruited by her brother Pierre (Julien Boisselier) to find women to help rescue a British geologist from a German hospital. He had been sent to study the soil on the beaches at Normandy in preparation for D-Day and was captured. For the mission, Louise chooses Jeanne (Julie Depardieu), a prostitute who is in prison for murder; an explosives expert Gaëlle Lemenech (Déborah François); and the ex-fiancé of Colonel Karl Heindrich, Suzy Desprez (Marie Gillain). The mission goes off well, but to their consternation, Pierre has another job for them. He needs them to go to Paris to kill Colonel Heindrich who believes the Allies are planning to land in Normandy.Excellent film, suspenseful, gritty, dark, and atmospheric, with wonderful performances by everyone, but especially Marceau, who plays the tough, quick, and enterprising Louise.I'm not sure why this film received a low rating on IMDb, and I also don't know where the bland title came from. I believe "Les femmes de l'ombre" means "Women of the Shadows." There must be something more exciting than "Female Agents."This isn't your typical movie; some of it is hard to watch, but the courage of these women is quite amazing.

I enjoy movies like this where the characters are speaking their own language. For example i really like the German language version of Das Boot. However the historical blunders spoiled the movie for me. If the Geologist had been in possession of such detailed information of the mulberry harbour units he would have been "BIGOT" listed and would never have been allowed out of England to make the survey. Then the use of a C47 for dropping agents was not done. It would have been a Lancaster or other bomber converted to drop agents. The date of the mission means that invasion stripes would not have been on any aircraft. the order to paint invasion stripes did not go out until June 3rd. Apart from one squadron of Mustangs. If a silenced pistol had been needed a single shot Welrod would have been used not the automatic one that the character used in the movie. overall a good shoot em up for a rainy afternoon but spoiled by the inaccuracies.

Films abound regarding arguably the greatest tragedy of mankind--World War II--and so many focus on the heroic sacrifices of men. What makes "Les Femmes de L'ombre" shine is that it features the typically unsung contributors to the war effort--the heroines who shared the same audacity and love of country and liberty as the men.Aside from its cast of four gorgeous French women (and an equally delightful Italian), it features a simple, but clever agenda--the actions of a cell of saboteurs and assassins working for the British Special Operations Executive (SOE) in occupied France. There are no fantastic stories here--no plots to kill Hitler or to sabotage atomic research. Instead, the story narrows its focus to the extraordinary efforts to keep secret the particulars of the inevitable invasion of the European continent by the Allies. This is no small order, and there is much suffering in keeping what must remain secret.The emotions in the film are well played by the actors and actresses. During the few brutal, but necessary scenes, the cries of anguish and pain are real and powerfully emotive. Louise (Sophie Marceau) is convincing as a vengeful widow who works alongside her dedicated brother, Pierre (Julien Boisselier). Jeanne (Julie Depardieu, daughter of the famous French actor Gerard Depardieu) plays a callous whore motivated at first by remission of her prison sentence, then by money, then by revenge. Gaëlle (Déborah François) portrays the naïve, religious girl who is seemingly the only true French patriot of the group. Maria (Maya Sansa) is a driven, Italian Jew whose family met its fate in a concentration camp. The most reluctant member is the lovely Suzy (Marie Gillain), whose questionable past allied her with the most unlikely of characters, Colonel Heindrich (Moritz Bleibtreu) of the Wehrmacht and the film's major antagonist. Unexpected support comes from local profiteer, Eddy (Vincent Rottiers), whose connection to Colonel Heindrich enables the saboteurs to get close to him to fulfill their mission.If there's a noticeable weakness to the film, it is Bleibtreu cast as a Nazi colonel. He's neither evil nor intimidating. He lacks the sinister persona of Colonel Landa (Christoph Waltz) of "Inglourious Basterds," a decidedly less serious film of the genre. Where Colonel Heindrich should have been clever and cruel, his performance instead is wooden and uninspiring. Bleibtreu may be a little out of his realm in a role so serious.Les Femmes de L'ombre is a solid contribution to the WWII films of the last decade. I hope it inspires more stories of the Resistance to be told with attention to the incredible sacrifices and dedication of normal people confronted with the horrors of Nazism.