Starring Sylvie Testud and Pascal Greggory. In French with English subtitles. Unrated. Plays Monday, September 15, Wednesday, September 17, and Friday to Sunday, September 19 to 21, at the Vancity Theatre

In the English-speaking world, popular prejudice suggests that the French were slackers during the Great War. Nothing, in fact, could be further from the truth. Indeed, until the summer of 1916, the Gauls were doing at least 80 percent of the wet work on the Western Front. It was only after the disastrous beginning of the ill-fated Nivelle Offensive (when the French Army suffered 70 percent more casualties than the British did on the first day of the Battle of the Somme) that Commonwealth troops started playing a commanding role.

This catastrophic suffering (87 percent of all French males between the ages of 17 and 40 were killed, wounded, or captured during the First World War) should always be borne in mind, therefore, when watching Serge Bozon’s latest feature. If most of the protagonists in La France are, technically, deserters, their reasons for flight are unusually well-founded.

The one exception to this rule is Camille (Sylvie Testud). Disguised as an enlisted man, she is actually searching for the husband who has advised her to forget she ever knew him. Camille is not seeking glory on the battlefield; she’s seeking answers from a man she hasn’t seen in years.

As for the deserters who reluctantly adopt her, they’re a pretty unusual lot. At the drop of a shell, they’ll stop marching, break out makeshift instruments, and start singing a half-bawdy, half-nostalgic song. These moments are the best in the film, as well as the weirdest.

Bozon and screenwriter Axelle Ropert do a superb job of keeping the film’s Brechtian and naturalistic elements in balance. This might not be the literal truth of 1914 to 1918, but it captures the spiritual reality of this colossal waste brilliantly.