Beau Travail Reviews
rubystevens
Super Reviewer
January 4, 2013
it's a visual poem over the thinly disguised bones of billy budd but it can't really be described, only experienced. the remarkable denis lavant strikes again. nice work indeed
Emil K
Super Reviewer
May 29, 2009
In many ways i am incapable to describe the beauty of this film. It is like a hallucinatory dream that leaves you with feeling of awe and mystery. Claire Denis who should now be considired as a one the most talented directors of today is at the peak of her powers here. Meditative shots of legionnaries training to Benjamin Britten's opera Billy Budd with robotic precision are so raw and yet so tender that it all becomes more closer to an ballet-performance than a military excercise. Actually with further research the plot seems to be variation on the American author Herman Melville's unfinished novella Billy Budd that i only know on basis. The Story is about Sergeant Galoup who comes obsessed about the new recruit Sentain who is in many ways like a younger version of himself with fatal consequences. The Whole film plays out with minimum dialogue and comes to a nearest thing of pure silent-film that i've seen in a long time. Beau Travail is not a experience that should be analyzed too much. It is all about experiencing and feeling. It is like a dream; you can chew on it, but in the end there is no right or wrong interpretation on it. It is something to live through, just like this film. What Claire Denis have achieved here is a strangely captivating film.
shannylee38
Super Reviewer
March 7, 2008
Finally, the final sequence is just memorable. It might seem completely out of there, but there is more than it seems.
The film is NOT straightforward in terms of narrative, but we just need to dig a little to understand deeply the soldiers.
Not an easy film to watch because it often goes back and forth from past to present. But visually, the film is gorgeous. The director knows where to frame her landscapes and how to frame her actors.
Finally, the final sequence is just memorable. It might seem completely out of there, but there is more than it seems.
The film is NOT straightforward in terms of narrative, but we just need to dig a little to understand deeply the soldiers.
May 25, 2011
French Top Gun. Or maybe that's too simplistic. OK, it is, but I don't care, Gregoire Colin looks suspiciously like George Clooney in that picture up there.
March 10, 2013
made in a deliberate Opera style film making... with the final suggestive suicide dance scene topping it all...
November 16, 2012
The most significant piece of cinema of the 90's, hands down. I would have said that regardless of it's last bold move, which was about as brilliant as cutting a woman's eye open with a knife leading to series of dream sequences, but this led this film to be not only the most significant work since the late 70's-present, but one of the greatest of all time.
The Critic
June 25, 2012
A visually superior films that engages with cinematographic beauty. The dialogue is minimal, but the film has a lot to say about male relationships and the impact of jealousy.
January 31, 2012
Lyrically moving and it has one of the best dance sequences ever caught on film.
May 26, 2011
Hard to sit through. Rather pretentious film. Explores theme of envy, but is presented way too slowly. Its an artsy film not for most, but some will love it.
dfwforeignbuff
December 16, 2008
Other reviewers talk about what a weak movie this was. The movie has some problems which I overlook. One criteria for a movie to work of me is to take me to places and do things which I have never done. I think many aspects of this movie were interesting. I think others were expecting too much from the homoerotic aspect of this movie. It is kind of a minimalist movie. No much happens only undercurrents of things happening. I loved the colors the cinematography, the harsh setting on the Mediterranean. I enjoyed the masculine rituals of the Legionaries exercise and regimen. I really could not grasp the purpose of their "Hugging" exercise. I call this a weak but beautiful film. I rate it 3 stars maybe 4 stars. not nearly as bad as all the other critics make it.
Das Floyd
August 17, 2008
[size=3] Beau Travail[/size]
[size=3] Directed by Claire Denis[/size]
[size=3] 1999[/size]
[size=3]For the longest time, the camera sits and observes the most banal things happening in Beau Travail, allowing nothing to happen, nothing to develop. Beau Travail's effective portrait of nothing is why the film works. Early on in the film, the squadron storms a building so barren, nothing could possibly hide in it, the building is concrete pillars, an abandoned parking lot, or an unfinished office building, something left alone to be overtaken by the desert a long time ago. The soldiers are products of something that happened a long time ago, they're like the desert they exist in. Empty, and full of lost hopes. The other important motif here is the dance club in the one city, the dance club at first feels like an area of release, but close attention reveals the expressions of boredom, even the parties in this film are part of repetition.[/size]
[size=3]The English title Good Work is suiting for the film, the film would be a void without work, work is the only thing keeping the soldiers here, work is the focus of their lives, day in and day out. Galoup's first words in the film being ?I have time to kill now?, his life was work and as we watch him pursue tasks so endlessly dull, the viewer starts to understand that the film is not a movie with a narrative base, but one with focus on rituals, many scenes solely focus on ritual exercise, folding clothes and the such with none or very little dialogue. The dialogue is secondary to action. This is a film of action and the meanings underneath the action. The meanings and motifs of the images in Beau Travail are harder to pick apart. Feelings of rancor permeate Galoup's existence, he keeps on working to fight off his desire for Sentain, who's youth attracts the other men in the squadron to him. It's these subtly played emotions which draw us in. But the viewer stays around for the rewarding experience Beau Travail offers. Interactions seem small, but carry a lot of weight, Galoup's rancor for Sentain becomes the focus of Galoup's work, Sentain is his work. Most of the information is relayed through Galoup's stream of conscious, making his angle the film's angle. The view is so outwardly narrow in it's appearance, yet open in it's interpretation of alienation, sexuality and the inner workings of a character who is essentially a drone stuck working in a landscape that France forgot about.[/size]
[size=3] Visually, the film is rapturous, you can practically taste the dirt, Denis has a sense of poetic realism, this poetic realism fits the film's tone. We watch a dozen men walk across a valley of boulders and rocks, the sea in the distance. The sea is very important to Beau Travail, the land is dry and filled with nothingness, but the Sea is filled the emotions in the psyche of the characters. And like the sea, it has depth.[/size][/center]
[center][size=3]"Begging for a word, a Gesture"[/size]
[size=3] Beau Travail[/size]
[size=3] Directed by Claire Denis[/size]
[size=3] 1999[/size]
[size=3]For the longest time, the camera sits and observes the most banal things happening in Beau Travail, allowing nothing to happen, nothing to develop. Beau Travail's effective portrait of nothing is why the film works. Early on in the film, the squadron storms a building so barren, nothing could possibly hide in it, the building is concrete pillars, an abandoned parking lot, or an unfinished office building, something left alone to be overtaken by the desert a long time ago. The soldiers are products of something that happened a long time ago, they're like the desert they exist in. Empty, and full of lost hopes. The other important motif here is the dance club in the one city, the dance club at first feels like an area of release, but close attention reveals the expressions of boredom, even the parties in this film are part of repetition.[/size]
[size=3]The English title Good Work is suiting for the film, the film would be a void without work, work is the only thing keeping the soldiers here, work is the focus of their lives, day in and day out. Galoup's first words in the film being ?I have time to kill now?, his life was work and as we watch him pursue tasks so endlessly dull, the viewer starts to understand that the film is not a movie with a narrative base, but one with focus on rituals, many scenes solely focus on ritual exercise, folding clothes and the such with none or very little dialogue. The dialogue is secondary to action. This is a film of action and the meanings underneath the action. The meanings and motifs of the images in Beau Travail are harder to pick apart. Feelings of rancor permeate Galoup's existence, he keeps on working to fight off his desire for Sentain, who's youth attracts the other men in the squadron to him. It's these subtly played emotions which draw us in. But the viewer stays around for the rewarding experience Beau Travail offers. Interactions seem small, but carry a lot of weight, Galoup's rancor for Sentain becomes the focus of Galoup's work, Sentain is his work. Most of the information is relayed through Galoup's stream of conscious, making his angle the film's angle. The view is so outwardly narrow in it's appearance, yet open in it's interpretation of alienation, sexuality and the inner workings of a character who is essentially a drone stuck working in a landscape that France forgot about.[/size]
[size=3] Visually, the film is rapturous, you can practically taste the dirt, Denis has a sense of poetic realism, this poetic realism fits the film's tone. We watch a dozen men walk across a valley of boulders and rocks, the sea in the distance. The sea is very important to Beau Travail, the land is dry and filled with nothingness, but the Sea is filled the emotions in the psyche of the characters. And like the sea, it has depth.[/size][/center]
winkyfrown
July 22, 2008
Beau Travail is probably a good movie to watch if you want something to fall asleep to. I enjoy movies that are slower paced, but this is just ridiculous. Have you ever watched the ocean do its thing for about 20 minutes in a movie before? You have if you've seen this movie. Also, do not be misled by the cover--there is no gay sex to be found here. The only reason this got a 3 was for the badass, ridiculous dance scene at the very end. The downside to such an awesome scene is that you really have to sit through the whole movie and want to die and then see the scene for it really to have the right effect, I think. I wouldn't recommend this movie to anyone who wants to watch something interesting, with a plot, or entertaining.
thierryjean
January 25, 2008
tout y est
contacts avec la population, hierarchie du groupe
rapport au terrain
en prime l' ambiguite des relations entre le commandant et la recrue
et l'affrontement inevitable avec le sergent delaisse
paysages magnifiques de godar agnes pas l'autre
choregraphie grecque
gregoire colin craquant emcore plus aue d'habitude
en double file les rapports de la vedette justement avec le realisateur
un film qui restera
avec paa grand chose claire denis arrive a faire vivre ce film uniquement axe sur un groupe humain
tout y est
contacts avec la population, hierarchie du groupe
rapport au terrain
en prime l' ambiguite des relations entre le commandant et la recrue
et l'affrontement inevitable avec le sergent delaisse
paysages magnifiques de godar agnes pas l'autre
choregraphie grecque
gregoire colin craquant emcore plus aue d'habitude
en double file les rapports de la vedette justement avec le realisateur
un film qui restera
jan 411
June 23, 2007
[font=Century Gothic][size=3][color=dimgray]Sublime[/color][/size][/font]
zach.seely
June 12, 2007
A real fantastic adaptation of "Billy Bud." The film is very rhythmic and primitive, but also very sophisticated.
andarsoninflame
December 18, 2006
I've had quite a week, the power was out for 3 days at my house, was bored to no end, been playing Okami, FFXII and Splinter Cell: Double agent(PS2/Xbox version not the 360 version mind you) and enjoying all 3 a lot, haven't seen lots as of lately but A woman is a Woman has become a new addition to my top ten along with Beau Traveil, gotta love the french film industry!
well, how you folks been as of now?
I've had quite a week, the power was out for 3 days at my house, was bored to no end, been playing Okami, FFXII and Splinter Cell: Double agent(PS2/Xbox version not the 360 version mind you) and enjoying all 3 a lot, haven't seen lots as of lately but A woman is a Woman has become a new addition to my top ten along with Beau Traveil, gotta love the french film industry!
BigFlax
September 23, 2004
[i]Beau Travail[/i] is not just set in Africa - it appears to personify Africa in the Legionnaires, pushed around by a superior, Galoup, who wants what's best for himself and doesn't care if they go spinning out of control. At once a critique of France's history in Africa as well as a metaphor for it, the film also goes after the military lifestyle. Denis paints it as curiously homoerotic - Galoup is the model Legionnaire, but he desires attention from his commanding officer, and plots revenge when one of the men he commands, Sentain, receives that attention instead.
Denis pays more attention to the culture of Djibouti, where the movie is set, than she would have to if the movie were more direct. The references to France's African policy are myriad, though. Galoup screams at one Legionnaire that as a member of the French Legion, he is "no longer African." The Africans glimpsed throughout the film seem plainly resentful of the French presence.
[i]Beau Travail[/i] seems to condone the removal of troops from Africa - the Africans don't want them there and the men seem a bit off-kilter after spending so much time in a remote wasteland by the Red Sea. Denis lingers on sometimes silly-looking exercises as if to question their purpose, which adds to the military critique. So does Galoup's return to France - once there, he cannot do anything that does not fall into his old military routine in one way or another. He is a man who has been ruined by order.
With an ironic title as bitter as most of the proceedings, [i]Beau Travail[/i] is a cutting look at military culture and latter-day French imperialism that hits a lot of targets. It may be a minor ordeal (even at just 90 minutes) due to its general quietness and slow pace, but anyone who can make it through will be rewarded with a lot to think about.
European minimalist cinema is often not the easiest type of film to watch (some might say "sit through"), but what it lacks in flair it frequently makes up for in ideas. Case in point: Claire Denis' [i]Beau Travail[/i], a slow-moving, stark portrayal of a French Foreign Legion unit in Africa, which is never flashy but serves as a potent allegory and scathing political critique nonetheless.
[i]Beau Travail[/i] is not just set in Africa - it appears to personify Africa in the Legionnaires, pushed around by a superior, Galoup, who wants what's best for himself and doesn't care if they go spinning out of control. At once a critique of France's history in Africa as well as a metaphor for it, the film also goes after the military lifestyle. Denis paints it as curiously homoerotic - Galoup is the model Legionnaire, but he desires attention from his commanding officer, and plots revenge when one of the men he commands, Sentain, receives that attention instead.
Denis pays more attention to the culture of Djibouti, where the movie is set, than she would have to if the movie were more direct. The references to France's African policy are myriad, though. Galoup screams at one Legionnaire that as a member of the French Legion, he is "no longer African." The Africans glimpsed throughout the film seem plainly resentful of the French presence.
[i]Beau Travail[/i] seems to condone the removal of troops from Africa - the Africans don't want them there and the men seem a bit off-kilter after spending so much time in a remote wasteland by the Red Sea. Denis lingers on sometimes silly-looking exercises as if to question their purpose, which adds to the military critique. So does Galoup's return to France - once there, he cannot do anything that does not fall into his old military routine in one way or another. He is a man who has been ruined by order.
With an ironic title as bitter as most of the proceedings, [i]Beau Travail[/i] is a cutting look at military culture and latter-day French imperialism that hits a lot of targets. It may be a minor ordeal (even at just 90 minutes) due to its general quietness and slow pace, but anyone who can make it through will be rewarded with a lot to think about.
