In Alain Resnais’ “La Guerre est Fini,” filmed in 1966, Yves Montand plays a somewhat tired and aging Spanish leftist  revolutionary working underground from France, making runs across the border into Franco’s Spain in the 1960s, trying to organize a general strike there.  The film is shot in black and white and is linear in progression, following Montand’s character through his underground daily activity:  carefully observing streets to see if he or others are being followed, tracking down colleagues living in Paris to pass on warnings, hiding leaflets in cars at safe houses, etc.   There is not much violence, but a lot of intrigue.   There is ambiguity, and we, the viewers, have to fit the pieces together.   Do a series of arrests being made in Spain, plus Domingo’s questioning at the border,  mean he has been exposed?    We are never sure.   We also witness a lot of revolutionary theory being discussed, the old Marxist question whether to wait for “objective conditions” (in Spain) to be ripe for revolution, or to push things along by violence, to spark things, as Lenin did in Russia in 1917.  We see Montand’s party bosses convening in Paris, operating under the rules of “democratic centralism,” arguing Marxist theory, although this is not explicit.   Carlos, or Domingo, names for Montand’s character, is accused by his own party of losing his revolutionary vision, since he has been in the field too long.  He is too afraid of losing his agents by moving too fast.   At the same time, Domingo runs into a younger violent generation of independent revolutionaries in Paris, creating bombs, not relying on union activities in Spain.   This younger group condemns Domingo for not supporting terror.   Ultimately, Domingo is demoted by his own bosses, but he is forced back into action, and dispatched on a final trip into Spain to carry an important message there.    But, after his departure, it is learned in Paris that Domingo is most likely walking into a trap.

There is a wonderful ending to the movie, when Domingo’s lover in Paris, Marianne (Ingrid Thulin), offers to fly to Barcelona to intercept Domingo.  It is not certain she will make it in time, but you feel she will.  She is one of Domingo’s “lucky stars,” which he refers to earlier in the movie.  Marianne is like lots of other women working for the cause, all shown in a quick montage of women with handbags walking quickly, backtracking through Spanish streets, avoiding detection, walking up escalators, down empty streets, on rainy sidewalks, all doing their dangerous duty, following tradecraft.  Women, we see, play a major role in the secret war.   In the final scene, we see two separate shots: Marianne smiling in the French airport waiting for the flight to Barcelona, then Domingo smiling while driving his convertible on the Spanish highway.  You think things will be all right.  Marianne will save him.  But, you can’t be certain.  The movie ends that way.