A Very Long Engagement Deals on Audrey Tautou

Great movie!

Reviewed by Natalie M. Ramirez, 2010-03-04

I love this movie, and it never gets old. It's funny and witty, romantic, thrilling, and it is NOT a chick flick. There are some violent scenes, including war scenes. Call me sappy, but I cry every time I watch it. Audrey Tautou is terrific, as are Marion Cotillard and Jodie Foster. It's in French, so be sure to turn the subtitles on!

Endearing

Reviewed by Steve, 2010-01-03

A Very Long Engagement caught my eye because it was the work of a gifted director and actress who teamed up for one of my favorite movies of all time, Amélie. I hoped for the same kind of breathtaking visual feast and empathetic story. I was not disappointed.
While Engagement is decidedly graver, it nonetheless has its charm and thanks to the remarkable Audrey Tautou, the driving character in the movie captured my interest and carried me through this densely woven and mysterious plot. Tautou is a treasure as the main character Mathilde, a young girl obsessed with getting to the truth behind her young lover's disappearance while fighting in WWI. The characterizations of this girl are brilliant and it is impossible not to be taken in by her methods of determining fate. Foolishly, I thought I was the only one who did such things...
Filmed in sepia tones and loaded with gorgeous reproductions of WWI era France, director Jean-Pierre Jeunet lays out a fascinating tale of the enduring power of love and the dream smothering finality of war. He avoids overt anti-war lecturing in favor of the matter-of-fact starkness of ordinary people put in extraordinary circumstances. Films that deal with war are best when they avoid heroic clichés or preachy sentiments, opting for the commonality of human reaction. A Very Long Engagement is such a film.

Simply dazzling on every level.

Reviewed by Charles Pierce II, 2009-12-08

A visual feast. A masterful performance by Ms. Tautou and others, including Jodi Foster in a cameo. The best depiction of WWI trench warfare I've ever seen - you feel how savage, de-humanizing and pointless it was. All this and a clever love story binds the floating pieces together, making them into a captivating mystery. Bravo!

"Amelie" meets "Saving Private Ryan"...

Reviewed by nicjaytee, 2009-10-22

A bizarre mix indeed but, believe it or not, it's a pretty apt description of this very odd but quite brilliant film.

First off, you get the most realistic depiction of what war must be like since "Saving Private Ryan", only this time the scene is the trenches in the Somme in 1917... so meticulously recreated, believably presented and deeply shocking that it will leave you stunned and drained by the time you've got through the first section of the film.

But then things become very different as director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and lead actress Audrey Tautou take very distinct aspects of their comic classic, "Amelie", and rework them into a much "darker" mix involving a charmingly poignant love story and an extremely complex and, in the end, pretty unbelievable detective story, centred on the fate of five men sentenced to almost certain death for self-mutilation in the trenches. Tautou plays a tougher but actually similarly sweet & quirky character to Amelie, and Jeunet uses a number of the same directing techniques that made "Amelie" such unconventional but fascinating viewing - flash backs, unusual camera angles, fast scene cutting, bizarre events, and intriguingly odd characters - right down to a secret box that holds the key to a mystery.

And, like "Amelie", the dialogue is in French and its delivery is fast, meaning that if you're trying to follow it with English sub-titles you're quite likely to get lost at key points. None of which sounds too promising. But no matter, because the detective story element of the film is fairly predictable, the dénouement to the love story holds no surprises and, their not why the film fully deserves a five star rating.

Why it does is because Jeunet is such a brilliant director and, as a result, the film is stuffed full with superb cinemaphotograhy, first class acting, wonderful scene-setting and, above all, a "pace" that holds your attention throughout and a "style" that makes for, at times, quite beautiful viewing... until, that is, you're plunged back into his equally brilliant vision of what life was actually like in the mud, squalor and blood of the trenches.

Horrific, charming, wholly believable and pretty unbelievable, all at the same time, "A Very Long Engagement" is an extremely strange film but one that will leave you marvelling at the sheer quality of its direction, photography and acting... and, as "Saving Private Ryan" achieved so successfully, it's depiction of the grim realities of war make it one of the best anti-war films that you're likely to see and one that you won't forget for a very long time.

"Amelie" meets "Saving Private Ryan"...

Reviewed by nicjaytee, 2009-10-22

A bizarre mix indeed but, believe it or not, it's a pretty apt description of this very odd but quite brilliant film.

First off, you get the most realistic depiction of what war must be like since "Saving Private Ryan", only this time the scene is the trenches in the Somme in 1917... so meticulously recreated, believably presented and deeply shocking that it will leave you stunned and drained by the time you've got through the first section of the film.

But then things become very different as director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and lead actress Audrey Tautou take very distinct aspects of their comic classic, "Amelie", and rework them into a much "darker" mix involving a charmingly poignant love story and an extremely complex and, in the end, pretty unbelievable detective story, centred on the fate of five men sentenced to almost certain death for self-mutilation in the trenches. Tautou plays a tougher but actually similarly sweet & quirky character to Amelie, and Jeunet uses a number of the same directing techniques that made "Amelie" such unconventional but fascinating viewing - flash backs, unusual camera angles, fast scene cutting, bizarre events, and intriguingly odd characters - right down to a secret box that holds the key to a mystery.

And, like "Amelie", the dialogue is in French and its delivery is fast, meaning that if you're trying to follow it with English sub-titles you're quite likely to get lost at key points. None of which sounds too promising. But no matter, because the detective story element of the film is fairly predictable, the dénouement to the love story holds no surprises and, their not why the film fully deserves a five star rating.

Why it does is because Jeunet is such a brilliant director and, as a result, the film is stuffed full with superb cinemaphotograhy, first class acting, wonderful scene-setting and, above all, a "pace" that holds your attention throughout and a "style" that makes for, at times, quite beautiful viewing... until, that is, you're plunged back into his equally brilliant vision of what life was actually like in the mud, squalor and blood of the trenches.

Horrific, charming, wholly believable and pretty unbelievable, all at the same time, "A Very Long Engagement" is an extremely strange film but one that will leave you marvelling at the sheer quality of its direction, photography and acting... and, as "Saving Private Ryan" achieved so successfully, it's depiction of the grim realities of war make it one of the best anti-war films that you're likely to see and one that you won't forget for a very long time.