|
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| At
the core of this story is hope. We may not understand what sustains
Mathilde’s hope, but we do see that the hope is what sustains
her. She is willing to give all she has to find her lover. That hope
rides a roller coaster as things look promising or dire, but Mathilde
is never ready to get off the coaster. Even after finding his grave,
she continues on her quest in hope that even that grave is wrong. |
Un long dimanche de fiançailles
(2004) Film Review |
| This
page was created on December 15, 2004
This page was last updated on
January 4, 2005
—Overview
—Trailers, Photos
—About
this Film pdf
—Spiritual Connections
Dial up modems will take a few moments |
| CREDITS |
| Directed
by Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Novel by Sébastien Japrisot novel
Screenplay by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Guillaume
Laurant
Cast
(in credits order)
Audrey Tautou .... Mathilde
Gaspard Ulliel .... Manech
Jean-Pierre Becker .... Lieutenant Esperanza
Dominique Bettenfeld .... Ange Bassignano
Clovis Cornillac .... Benoît Notre-Dame
Marion Cotillard .... Tina Lombardi
Jean-Pierre Darroussin .... Benjamin Gordes
Julie Depardieu .... Véronique Passavant
Jean-Claude Dreyfus .... Commandant Lavrouye
André Dussollier .... Rouvières
Ticky Holgado .... Germain Pire
Tchéky Karyo .... Captain Favourier
Jérôme Kircher .... Bastoche
Denis Lavant .... Six-Soux
Chantal Neuwirth .... Bénédicte
Dominique Pinon .... Sylvain
Produced
by
Francis Boespflug .... associate producer
Bill Gerber .... executive producer
Jean-Louis Monthieux .... executive producer
Original Music by Angelo Badalamenti
Non-Original Music by Camille Saint-Saëns
(from "Danse macabre") and Giuseppe Verdi (aria "Pace,
pace, mio Dio!" from opera "La forza del destino")
Cinematography by Bruno Delbonnel
Film Editing by Hervé Schneid
MPAA: Rated R for violence
and sexuality.
Runtime: 134 min
For rating reasons, go to FILMRATINGS.COM,
and MPAA.ORG.
Parents, please refer to PARENTALGUIDE.ORG
|
| TRAILERS
AND CLIPS |
| —Trailers,
Photos |
| BOOK |
A
Very Long Engagement : A Novel
by Sebastien Japrisot
January 1917: five French soldiers are marched to their own front
lines where they will be tossed out into no man's land with their
hands tied behind their backs and left for the Germans to shoot. They
were, in civilian life, variously a pimp, a mechanic, a farmer, a
carpenter, and a fisherman; now they are condemned because each had
sought to leave the war by shooting himself in the hand. Taken to
a godforsaken trench nicknamed Bingo Crépuscule, the five are
reluctantly sent out into the darkness; days later, five bodies are
recovered and the families are notified, merely, that the men died
in the line of duty. August
1919: Mathilde Donnay receives a letter from a dying man. In it,
the former soldier tells her that he met her beloved fiancé,
the fisherman Manech, shortly before he died. Mathilde goes to meet
Sergeant Daniel Esperanza at his hospital and there hears the story
of the execution. She also receives a package with a photograph
of the men and copies of their last letters. As Mathilde reads and
rereads the letters and goes over Esperanza's tale, she begins to
suspect that perhaps the story didn't end quite so neatly. And so
begins her very long investigation into the mysterious circumstances
surrounding the deaths of five condemned prisoners--one of whom,
at least, might not really be dead.
In
Mathilde Donnay, Sebastien Japrisot has created one of the most
compelling and delightful heroines in modern fiction. Though confined
to a wheelchair since childhood, "Mathilde has other lives,
varied and quite beautiful ones." She paints, cares for her
pets, enjoys a rich fantasy life, and is relentless in her search
for the truth about Manech's death. But she is by no means the only
vibrant personality leaping off Japrisot's pages. This author has
a remarkable ability to draw even minor characters in three dimensions
with economy and wit. Take Mathilde's mother, for instance, caught
in mid-card game: "At bridge, manille, bezique, Mama is a dirty
rotten swine. Not only is she an ace with the pasteboards, but she
throws her opponents off their mettle by insulting or making fun
of them." And even the characters we meet only through other
people's memories--the condemned men--are so fully realized that
you find yourself torn over which one you hope may have survived.
As Mathilde comes ever closer to solving the mystery of what happened
at Bingo Crépuscule that January morning in 1917, Sebastien
Japrisot proves himself a master storyteller and A Very Long Engagement
a near perfect novel. --Alix Wilber
|
| POSTER |
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|
| SYNOPSIS
|
| From
the director and star of Amélie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Audrey
Tautou) comes a very different love story: A VERY LONG
ENGAGEMENT. Based on the acclaimed novel by Sebastien
Japrisot, the adapted screenplay was written by Jeunet & Guillaume
Laurant.
As
World War I draws to an end, a young French woman’s greatest
fight is about to begin. Mathilde has received word that her fiancé
Manech is one of five wounded soldiers who have been court-martialed
and pushed out into the no-man’s land between the French and
German armies… and almost certain death.
Unwilling
to accept that her beloved Manech is lost to her forever, Mathilde
embarks on an extraordinary journey to discover the fate of her
lover. At each turn, she receives a different heartbreaking variation
on how Manech must have spent those last days, those last moments.
Still, she never gets discouraged.
If
Manech were dead, Mathilde would know.
With
a steadfast faith, strengthened by hope and a stubbornly cheerful
disposition, Mathilde follows her investigation to its conclusion,
convincing those who might help her and ignoring those who will
not. As she draws closer to the truth about the five unfortunate
soldiers and their brutal punishment, she is drawn deeper into the
horrors of war and the indelible marks it leaves on those whose
lives it has touched.
|
  Review
by DARREL MANSON
A
Very Long Engagement
reunites actress Audrey Tautou and director Jean-Pierre Jeunet who
together made the pleasant love story Amélie.
But don’t look for the same light-hearted comedy this time
out.
—Review
continued here
|
| |
 Review
by ED TRAVIS
 War
is hell. There are very
few war films that communicate a message any different from that
one. A Very Long Engagement is a film which shows the hellacious
nature of war, but also shows the toll it takes on the non-combatants;
the families of those who are fighting and dying. Yet in the hands
of director Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the film is also a warm and quirky
and romantic fairy tale version of the horrors of war. This description
may seem impossible to swallow for some. But picture what was
done in the film Life is Beautiful, by Roberto Benigni. Set amidst
the holocaust, Benigni was able to tell a warm and often funny
story which never disrespected the serious loss the Jews suffered.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet loves to tell stories, and he adds fairy tale
elements to many of his films, or presents them in outright fairy
tale form, such as his City of the Lost Children. This tale is
no different. Our heroine is Mathilde (Audrey Tautou), a polio
sufferer who sets out on a quest to figure out what happened to
her lover, Manech (Gaspard Ulliel), during a World War I trench
battle.
Review
continued here
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