Diplomacy

Niels Arestrup and André Dussollier reprise their stage roles of General Dietrich von Choltitz and Raoul Nordling in Volker Schlöndorff's fascinating account of the overnight meeting that saved Paris from destruction by the Nazis on 25 August 1944. In fact, such a definitive encounter between the occupied capital's German governor and the Paris-born Swedish diplomat never took place, as the delicate negotiations lasted for days and involved discussions about the exchange of prisoners and the preservation of the city's majestic architecture. But Cyril Gely's clever dialogue (from his own play) will quickly convince any sceptics that such witty, pithy exchanges could have happened, as Nordling pleaded for his home town and von Choltitz weighed his duty against the fate of his family and his posthumous reputation. Gert Fröbe and Orson Welles played the same parts in René Clément's sprawling epic, Is Paris Burning? (1966). But this is superior in every regard.