'L'armée du Crime' focuses on the French Resistance ‘Manouchian group', Paris-based communists, led by the Armenian poet Missak Manouchian, and consisting of Jews, Hungarians, Poles and others who helped the armed struggle against Nazi occupation. The film describes the radicalisation and differing motives of Manouchian and his comrades and the execution of their mission – an ultimately fatal one as we know from the 22 names read out over the opening credits to the refrain of ‘Mort pour la France'.