French director Jean-Pierre Jeunet could have taken the easy way out for his follow-up to his smash film "Amelie," but instead he chose to put his unique imprimatur on Sebastian Japrisot's respected World War I novel "A Very Long Engagement."

While it might be hard to imagine, Jeunet takes some of the more successful and more whimsical aspects of "Amelie" and adapts them to work perfectly in a heavier, darker story.

Instead of focusing on the soldiers and on the battlefield, as many World War I films do, Jeunet (and Japrisot, of course), center the story on the families back home. In this case, they focus on Mathilde (Audrey Tautou), the polio-stricken girlfriend of Manech (Gaspard Ulliel), a woefully young and innocent soldier driven mad by what he witnesses during battle.

Manech and four other men are condemned to die for maiming themselves with the hope of getting discharged. The men are taken to a front line trench called Bingo Crepuscule and from there, they are sent over the top to die out in the open, presumably from enemy fire, starvation or exposure.

Meanwhile, back at home in the lush countryside of Brittany, Mathilde -- living with her aunt and uncle (Dominique Pinon, of "Amelie" and "City of Lost Children") -- waits for Manech. Even after she receives news of Manech's death, she refuses to believe he's dead, and the bulk of the film follows her investigation.

At the same time, the lover of another of the condemned men keeps hope alive that her lover has survived. When she discovers that he is not, she begins a campaign of revenge against those who doomed him.

As in "Amelie," Jeunet uses flashbacks and surreal tones to render this heartbreaking tale of love, loss and war, but to his credit he never trivializes the war or the storyline. His period flashback scenes offer visual relief and a pressure valve from the darkness of the plot. They also serve to push forward what could be a slow-moving two-plus-hour film.

Tautou, who has really only been seen in lighter roles until now, offers a credible and sympathetic performance and Ulliel is wonderful as both the wide-eyed young man and also the shell-shocked battle weary soldier. Jodie Foster also makes a brief but powerful appearance as the wife of another of the condemned soldiers.

If Jeunet hasn't made a masterpiece with "A Very Long Engagement," he's made a very good film -- visually, emotionally and narratively -- and one so different from its predecessor that the director/screenwriter deserves credit for moving forward.

"A Very Long Engagement" opens in Milwaukee on Wednesday, Dec. 22.