Villameurs, a successful French operative in the British Special Operations Executive (SOE). The plot is rather silly, but it's fun to watch. Marceau leads a group of three rather ditzy girls who go on to become great assassins in the course of a few weeks.

The film opens with Marceau as a sniper trying to pick off a German officer. The German officer unfortunately picks off her husband, another Resistance fighter, first. We see her pain, but guess what - she keeps shooting. Her operative mission, rather than love, comes first.

The film shows Lise tortured, losing a much longed-for baby with her dead husband (she did live to be 98 but never had children), and seeing her beloved brother, another operative, being tortured to death in front of her. Throughout the film she takes unbelievable risks that most of us would have run away from.

It is true not everyone behaved like Lise did during the war. The wonderful book, Suite Francaise, by Irene Nemerovsky, who was deported and died in the camps, is a terrible indictment of life in a small French

village during the war, and how little people did to save the Jews. But there were plenty of men and women like Louise, men and women who died young and senselessly to save their country from the Nazi occupation. When I walk through my neighbourhood, I see plenty of plaques on buildings testifying that someone once lived there, but was gunned down by the Gestapo.

I always like to think that I would do the right thing in a situation. But war is scary. And when you are a parent, it's scarier - you want bread and water and medicine and a place to keep your family safe.

So the film changed my mind. Was the Resistance an exaggerated myth? I don't think so. Certainly, I don't think there were nearly as many members as the French would like us to believe, but I think that every single one who took those risks and fought for what they believed in was an extraordinary human being.
Janine di Giovanni's latest book, The Place at the End of the World, is published by Bloomsbury.