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Movies / On DVD / The Duchess of Langeais
The Duchess of Langeais

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The Duchess of Langeais (2008)

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Reviews Counted:61

Fresh:41

Rotten:20

Average Rating:6.4/10

Consensus: At times plodding and dialogue heavy, The Duchess of Langeais is nevertheless an intriguing and rewarding dissection of class and gender relations.

Rated: Not Rated

Runtime: 2 hrs 17 mins

Genre: Foreign Films

Theatrical Release:Feb 22, 2008 Limited

Synopsis: Jacques Rivette (VA SAVOIR) directs this masterful adaptation of Honoré de Balzac's novel about a game of hearts between General Armand de Montriveau (Guillaume Depardieu), a protégé of Bonaparte... Jacques Rivette (VA SAVOIR) directs this masterful adaptation of Honoré de Balzac's novel about a game of hearts between General Armand de Montriveau (Guillaume Depardieu), a protégé of Bonaparte in Restoration-era France, and Antoinette (Jeanne Balibar), the married but flirtatious Duchess of Langeais. They meet at a ball where Armand--intense, morose, and lacking the embroidered manner of the aristocracy--is currently en vogue following a military campaign. The two become frequent companions. But it is unclear whether the Duchess wants a lover or a lapdog, leading to romantic frustrations for Armand who cannot live, like his compatriots, with Parisian society's unspoken and tacitly accepted hypocrisies. As a sentimental war rages between them--with Antoinette stoking the fires of passion and Armand unexpectedly turning the tables on his lover--the film raises provocative questions about the true sources of desire. Taking place in parlors that echo with chatter and creaking floorboards, THE DUCHESS OF LANGEAIS offers a restrained and realistic evocation of the 1820s. Composed of graceful widescreen compositions that decline to comment on the action, and interspersed excerpts from the novel that take the viewer out of it, the film's emotional reserve matches its story and heightens its fraught romance. In his role as a man tortured by his obsession, and all too willing to wound himself in its pursuit, Depardieu is mesmerizing. Though clocking in at over two hours, Rivette's film is an engrossing slow burn that crackles to a climax that is as inevitable as it is devastating. [More]

Starring: Jeanne Balibar, Guillaume Depardieu, Bulle Ogier, Michel Piccoli

Starring: Jeanne Balibar, Guillaume Depardieu, Bulle Ogier, Michel Piccoli, Barbet Schroeder, Anne Cantineau, Marc Barbe, Thomas Durand, Nicolas Bouchaud

Director: Jacques Rivette

Director: Jacques Rivette
Screenwriter: Pascal Bonitzer, Christine Laurent
Producer: Pierre Grise Productions
Composer: Pierre Allio
Studio: IFC Films

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Release:

Aug 12, 2008

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Reviews for The Duchess of Langeais

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1 - 20 (sorted by date)
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N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix | comment Comment
04/23/09
Peter Keough
Peter Keough
Boston Phoenix

It's charged with nuance yet ultimately an exercise in compressed literary adaptation.

Full Review Source: Chicago Reader | comment Comment
12/17/08
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Jonathan Rosenbaum
Chicago Reader
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Visually arresting period drama finds the core of the emotional life of its characters in the debate between the duchess and the general about love. Balzac fans will delight.

Full Review Source: Film-Forward.com | comment Comment
12/17/08
Nora Lee Mandel
Nora Lee Mandel
Film-Forward.com

Balibar's sly mouth tightens with mean glee as she plays all the Duchesses' games, and Depardieu's brooding, battered face ceaselessly signals the General's suppressed, sexualized violence.

Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | comment Comment
11/25/08
Dan Callahan
Dan Callahan
Slant Magazine
N/R

Click to read the article

Full Review Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch | comment Comment
10/18/08
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Maybe even Rivette himself is a little too delicate for this ferocious, intensely focused pair. But he's fascinated by them, and ultimately, he loves them.

Full Review Source: Salon.com | comment Comment
10/18/08
Stephanie Zacharek
Stephanie Zacharek
Salon.com
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The Duchess of Langeais is a romantic dance of death.

Full Review Source: Baltimore Sun | comment Comment
07/25/08
Michael Sragow
Michael Sragow
Baltimore Sun

Of course, it would also help if we could understand what's supposed to be so alluring about the title character, Antoinette de Langeais.

Full Review Source: Deseret News, Salt Lake City | comment Comment
07/23/08
Jeff Vice
Jeff Vice
Deseret News, Salt Lake City

Stands with some of the best efforts of Rivette's long career.

Full Review Source: Austin Chronicle | comment Comment
06/20/08
Marjorie Baumgarten
Marjorie Baumgarten
Austin Chronicle

The everyday moviegoer will find it as impenetrable as its heroine. But if you vibrate to nuances of style, if you enjoy tension gathering strength beneath terrible restraint, if you admire great acting, then you will.

Full Review Source: Chicago Sun-Times | comment Comment
06/20/08
Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Chicago Sun-Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The director guides the viewer through a sly consideration of near-sociopathic not-quite-lovers, one of whom finds refuge in religion, the other in romantic obsession.

Full Review Source: Chicago Tribune | comment Comment
06/19/08
Michael Phillips
Michael Phillips
Chicago Tribune
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

If you like multi-arced episodes of Masterpiece (formerly Masterpiece Theatre), the pacing might work in this padded film. As it was, experiencing this in real time was akin to watching two snails race on a muddy track.

Full Review Source: HollywoodChicago.com | comment Comment
06/10/08
Adam Fendelman
Adam Fendelman
HollywoodChicago.com

A remote and chilly exercise, more museum piece than movie.

Full Review Source: One Guy's Opinion | comment Comment
06/07/08
Frank Swietek
Frank Swietek
One Guy's Opinion

Classy? Yes,

Full Review Source: St. Paul Pioneer Press | comment Comment
05/09/08
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
Chris Hewitt (St. Paul)
St. Paul Pioneer Press

Even though it's nearly 2 1/2 hours, unfolds in flashback and derives from Balzac, then, The Duchess of Langeais is among Rivette's more succinct and approachable works.

Full Review Source: Oregonian | comment Comment
05/09/08
Marc Mohan
Marc Mohan
Oregonian

The Duchess of Langeais is a stately costume drama of wrenching passions expressed in courtly phrases.

Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune | comment Comment
05/09/08
Colin Covert
Colin Covert
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Jacques Rivette’s Duchess of Langeais seems to me a nearly impeccable work of art -- beautiful, true, profound.

comment Comment
04/14/08
Manohla Dargis
Manohla Dargis
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

It is the ultimate in movie as pane of glass, completely un-self-conscious of its own movieness but simply an intensely focused examination of human behavior on a narrative armature.

Full Review Source: Washington Post | comment Comment
04/10/08
Stephen Hunter
Stephen Hunter
Washington Post
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Based on a Balzac story, Rivette's Duchess manages to be both old-fashioned in its settings and circumstances, and coolly modern in its view of thwarted passion and despair.

Full Review Source: Philadelphia Inquirer | comment Comment
03/28/08
Steven Rea
Steven Rea
Philadelphia Inquirer
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

The movie's satisfactions are subtle, but they run deep, and there are many.

Full Review Source: San Francisco Chronicle | comment Comment
03/21/08
Mick LaSalle
Mick LaSalle
San Francisco Chronicle
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
 
 
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