Snow and Fire (French: La Neige et le Feu) is a 1991 French war/drama film directed by Claude Pinoteau. Vladimir Cosma composed the soundtrack.
The story is set in late World War II France. Two childhood friends, Jacques Sénéchal (Vincent Perez) and Michel Fournier (Matthieu Rozé) enlist in the new Allies-aligned French army when Paris is liberated in August 1944. Michel and a nurse, Christiane Mercier (Géraldine Pailhas), fell in love during said liberation. Christiane gets pregnant, while Jacques and Michel take part to the bitter winter battles to retake the East of France (Lorraine, then Alsace) to the Germans.
Snow and Fire provides examples of the following tropes:
- Les Collaborateurs: Michel's father is a collaborationist, and gets condemned to death for that when Paris is liberated.
- The Medic: Christiane takes care of wounded FFI fighters during the Urban Warfare of the liberation of Paris. This is how she meets Michel.
- La Résistance: When the film starts, Michel is a FFI (Forces Françaises de l'Intérieur, "French Forces of the Interior"), who were the nationally organized armed branch of the French Resistance since 1943 and whose uprising in Paris in late August 1944 as the Allies were approaching kickstarted the city's liberation.
- Tank Goodness: The winter battle scenes boast well-known tanks of the era, notably the German Königstiger
. The (real) one used for the film belongs to the Saumur tank museum, it is the only one in the world that's still in running condition. - Urban Warfare: There are street fights during the liberation of Paris.
- Winter Warfare: The Alsace campaign largely takes place in winter, about at the same time as the Battle of the Bulge up North in Belgium and Luxembourg. The final fights take place during Operation Nordwind, an offensive Germans launched in Alsace in late December 1944 to try alleviating pressure from the Bulge.
