There's one thing you have to hand to the French, and that's that they still support French cinema. When The Round Up was released in its native country, it took 4 million Euros in its first weekend and knocked Shutter Island off the number one spot.

What makes it even more impressive is that not only did it achieve this without an international French star attached (although Jean Reno appears in it, it would be unfair to state he was leading male), but its subject matter of French Jews going off to the camps is hardly the material for a fun night out.

Although there have been hundreds of films about the holocaust, this one comes at it from a unique angle.

It's 1942 and Hitler is throwing his evil weight around. He's informed his Vichy collaborators that he wants them to round up 10,000 Jews and move them out of Paris into camps he's had built especially for them.

So in the dead of night the French police break into the homes of Jewish families, dragging them out with just a few of their possessions. They are held like prisoners in the Winter Velodrome, with little in the way of food or water. It's there that Annette Monod (mélanie Laurent), a young nurse, meets Jewish Doctor David Sheinbaum (Reno).

Soon after the families are moved by train to Baune; due to the sheer numbers of ill people, Annette begs the doctor to join them, which he manages to arrange. But once there, he is treated like the rest of the Jews, and it's only then that both Annette and all the Jewish families begin to understand the severity of their situation.

Listen, when you said that you wanted me to dress up in a nurse's uniform, this isn't what I had in mind.

Writer/director Rose Bosch has split the film into three sections: the first introduces the Jewish families in Paris; the second sees them moved to the Velodrome; and the third sees them at the holding camp of Baune before being moved off to their final destination – the concentration camps.

Unfortunately for the actors concerned, the story moves so swiftly from one to the other, that there's little time for any of them to deliver anything other than fear. Even Laurent's character, who we're supposed to witness the historical horrors unfold through, isn't as pivotal as she could have been. The fact is, the story is far more overwhelming than any one performance. If you're a sucker for young children looking lost and vulnerable, then chances are you'll get misty eyed in places, but other than that, it feels more like a theatrical ensemble more than anything else.

Bosch could have possibly focused her attention on the Veldodrome section more, as it's this section that many audiences may not be that familiar with. And if you're going to include scenes within the camps, then you better hope that they can compete with the likes of Schindler's List on an emotional level, otherwise why bother? Unfortunately for Bosch, the scenes within the camp feel just a little too made-for-TV in their delivery.

Still, although there's not one real stand-out performance, the cast do well to convey an authentic display of horror and dread, leading to one or two truly moving moments.