King of Hearts is a 1967 French film set in small French village at the end of World War I. Alan Bates portrays Scottish Private Charles Plumpick sent on a mission to detonate explosives set in the village by the retreating German army. He arrives to find the town deserted and mistakenly lets loose the remaining citizens from the local "lunatic asylum." The patients of the asylum take control of the town and name Plumpick their king. He is then faced with the decision to join the mentally challenged in their blissful world or carry out his mission. Plumpick's struggle is surrounded by a surreal and visually beautiful array of characters from the asylum. At its root, King of Hearts is an absurdist questioning of war. The new inhabitants of the town are completely naive to the conflict of the outside world and don't care to learn of it. Surrounding this isolated group are the German and Scottish armies who are portrayed as equally insane and farcical as the lunatics that briefly control the town. This juxtaposition brings out the undertones of war and impending doom which make the film a poignant and beautiful satire of the absurdities of war and conflict. King of Hearts is an entirely unique portrayal of war and one that is strikingly different from most war films or war satires produced in the United States.
Here's a link to the trailer:
http://www.spout.com/films/King_of_Hearts/19001/353977/trailers.aspx
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