Inscrutable and Insufferable
Silk (2007)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:55
Fresh:4
Rotten:51
Average Rating:3.8/10
Consensus: Silk contains a simple love triangle story but director Francois Gerard goes to painstaking lengths to turn it into a protracted and wearisome art film.
Theatrical Release:Sep 14, 2007 Limited
Box Office: $990,439
Synopsis: With SILK, director François Gerard (THIRTY TWO SHORT FILMS ABOUT GLENN GOULD, THE RED VIOLIN) brings Alessandro Baricco's bestselling novel to sumptuous life. Michael Pitt stars as Herve Joncour,... With SILK, director François Gerard (THIRTY TWO SHORT FILMS ABOUT GLENN GOULD, THE RED VIOLIN) brings Alessandro Baricco's bestselling novel to sumptuous life. Michael Pitt stars as Herve Joncour, a Frenchman who lives in a small town that has hit hard times. A local silkworm magnate (Alfred Molina) stumbles upon a solution for his town's troubles, and enlists Herve to travel to a hidden corner of Japan in order to smuggle back a boundless supply of rare silkworms. Traveling in disguise so that he won't be exposed, Herve succeeds in his mission. Upon returning home, he reunites with his beautiful, supportive wife, Helene (Keira Knightley). While Herve and Helene have a loving relationship, their inability to produce a child creates an undercurrent of distance between them. This is compounded when Herve meets a beautiful concubine (Sei Ashina) during one of his subsequent journeys, sparking a passionate encounter that will haunt him for the rest of his life. Gerard's adaptation of Baricco's novel spans several continents and many years. The production is aided by the lush imagery of cinematographer Alain Dostie and the haunting score from acclaimed composer Ryuichi Sakamoto (THE LAST EMPEROR). Featuring yet another standout performance from Molina, SILK tells an epic tale of love and loss in the 19th century. [More]
Starring: Michael Pitt, Keira Knightley, Koji Yakusho, Alfred Molina
Starring: Michael Pitt, Keira Knightley, Koji Yakusho, Alfred Molina, Sei Ashina
Director: Francois Gerard
Director: Francois Gerard
Screenwriter: Francois Girard, Michael Golding
Producer: Niv Fichman, Nadine Luque, Domenico Procacci, Sonoko Sakai
Composer: Ryuichi Sakamoto
Studio: Picturehouse
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Reviews for Silk
If there were an award for the gloomiest movie of the year, Silk would win hands down.
The stilted dialogue makes all of the actors sound as if they're being dubbed into English, badly, especially the English-speaking ones (Alfred Molina, looking seriously bored).
What we're told in Silk is that Michael Pitt is a French 19th-century silkworm merchant in love with his wife but obsessed with a mysterious woman he glimpses on business in Japan. What we see is a mopey fellow without the energy to comb his hair
Here's a little game you can play if you get bored during Silk, and you will get bored during Silk: How many actors do you suppose were offered the lead role before the producers settled on Michael Pitt?
Like being slapped in the face by a feather: You're surprised that something so soft can grab your attention but have neither emotional nor physical bruises to show for it.
Beneath the lovely surface it's dramatically threadbare...about as interesting as one of your neighbor's vacation slide shows.
Sumptuously photographed but achingly dull story of a French silk trader who finds unrequited love in 19th century Japan.
a singularly uninvolving bit of piffle crafted as though those who made it were afraid of waking someone
In a film that just happens to be about the topic of fabric, Silk like a mannequin draped in an elegant costume, is all shimmering surface and hollow core.
Alessandro Baricco's lyrical short novel is tentatively re-imagined as a saccharine love story with minimal depth.
Few movies ever have gone to such a length to tell so slight -- and, worse, unengaging -- a story.
What's happened to Girard, who made the original 32 Shorts about Glenn Gould, then the mediocre Red Violin, and now a dull, studied art film, a period tale of doomed romance with no chemistry entre Michael Pitt and Keira Knightley or Pitt and other woman
Latest News for Silk
September 11, 2007:
Silk preview & trailer ![]()
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August 23, 2007:
It's hard to imagine Brit beauty Knightley playing the long-suffering wife of an adulterous spouse who'd look at another woman - even if he's got a thing for a seductive geisha in faraway Japan, who happens to be the personal property of a powerful baron. ![]()
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August 22, 2007:
Trailer & Poster review ![]()
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