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Movies / On DVD / Fugitive Pieces
Fugitive Pieces

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Fugitive Pieces (2008)

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Reviews Counted:68

Fresh:45

Rotten:23

Average Rating:6.1/10

Consensus: Though the retelling is a bit too subtle, the moving story and solid performances lift Fugitive Pieces beyond standard holocaust tales.

Rated: R [See Full Rating] for some sexuality.

Runtime: 1 hr 48 mins

Genre: Dramas

Theatrical Release:May 2, 2008 Limited

Box Office: $449,048

Synopsis: Adapted from Anne Michael's acclaimed prose-poem novel, FUGITIVE PIECES is a harrowing and haunting tale of Holocaust survival and personal awakening. The film opens in Poland, as young Jakob Berr... Adapted from Anne Michael's acclaimed prose-poem novel, FUGITIVE PIECES is a harrowing and haunting tale of Holocaust survival and personal awakening. The film opens in Poland, as young Jakob Berr (Robbie Kay) is hidden away just before German soldiers storm into his Jewish family's home. After watching his parents murdered and his sister dragged away to an uncertain fate, Jakob flees and hides in the woods. He is discovered by a kindly Greek archaeologist, Athos (Rade Sherbedgia), who smuggles the sickly Jakob back to his own island home and hides him for the rest of the war. Years later, having moved to Canada, the grownup Jakob (Stephen Dillane) has become a writer struggling to articulate his childhood horrors, haunted by the mystery of his sister's fate. But after his troubled emotions lead to the breakup of his marriage to the free-spirited Alex (Rosamund Pike), Jakob must exorcise the ghosts of his past if he is to close a traumatic chapter of his life and find beauty in the present. Director Jeremy Podeswa (THE FIVE SENSES) ably shifts between the different stages of Jakob's life, showing how grief can continue to influence one's actions--or inaction--in the years that follow a tragedy. Handsomely shot and thoughtfully acted, FUGITIVE PIECES is a touching testimony to the power of remembrance and redemption. [More]

Starring: Stephen Dillane, Rade Sherbedgia, Rosamund Pike, Ayelet Zurer

Starring: Stephen Dillane, Rade Sherbedgia, Rosamund Pike, Ayelet Zurer, Robbie Kay, Ed Stoppard, Rachelle Lefevre, Nina Dobrev

Director: Jeremy Podeswa

Director: Jeremy Podeswa
Screenwriter: Jeremy Podeswa
Producer: Robert Lantos
Composer: Nikos Kypourgos
Studio: Samuel Goldwyn Films

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Release:

Oct 14, 2008

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Reviews for Fugitive Pieces

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Reviews
Tomatometer Critic Review Category
tomato

Leo Goldsmith

Nostalgic, deeply felt, and refreshingly astute, "Fugitive Pieces" is something of a rare bird these days%u2014a big-budget, transnational historical drama that actually justifies its scope and subject matter with more than visual opulence.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | Aug., 08 2009 12:36 PM

indieWIRE

splat

Philip French

Podeswa's confusing, commonplace film lumbers along with a painful sincerity.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | Jun., 02 2009 06:04 AM

Observer [UK]

splat
2/5

Tim Robey

Plays out with such daunting high-mindedness it makes The Reader look like Transformers.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 06:56 AM

Daily Telegraph

tomato
3/5

Charlotte O'Sullivan

Fugitive Pieces reduces the Holocaust and its aftermath to a cosy soap opera.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 06:44 AM

This is London

tomato
4/6

Wally Hammond

One of the most delicate, approachable and rewarding Holocaust movies of recent years.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 06:22 AM

Time Out

tomato
3/5

James Mottram

Given the source novel, Podeswa's attempt to adapt Fugitive Pieces is admirable in itself. Yet despite an enthusiastic cast, this fails to transport you in the same way. Tying itself in narrative knots, the end result is stilted.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 05:08 AM

Channel 4 Film

tomato
3/5

Kevin Maher

The movie has little dramatic momentum, and its journey is essentially Jakob’s incremental acceptance of his fate. But Dillane and the writer-director Jeremy Podeswa create such a compelling central character that it hardly matters.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 04:48 AM

Times [UK]

splat
2/5

Edward Porter

His journey towards peace of mind involves lots of lyrical philosophising, which presumably comes straight from the film’s source novel, by Anne Michaels, and doesn’t lend itself to dramatisation, despite Dillane’s typically intelligent performance.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 04:39 AM

Sunday Times (UK)

tomato
3/5

Andrew Pulver

Anne Michael's complex, poetic novel is here adapted into a stolid, somewhat po-faced film, but one that still manages to tease some affecting drama out of its scholarly premise.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 04:31 AM

Guardian [UK]

splat
2/5

Sophie Ivan

Despite a rich premise, the soul-searching of the older Jakob is, at best, curiously colourless; at worst, positively grating.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 04:13 AM

Little White Lies

tomato
3/5

Chris Prince

An intermittently powerful, if not entirely successful, piece.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 03:44 AM

Sky Movies

tomato
4/5

Matt Glasby

But while there’s life, there’s hope, and Jeremy Podeswa’s delicate, deliberate adaptation of Anne Michaels’ novel follows Jakob’s heartrending progress from the darkness to the light.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 03:24 AM

Total Film

splat
2/5

Karl French

There are fleeting moments of poignancy and poetry, significantly when the script features narration taken almost directly from the novel, but this is clunkily written and poorly edited.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 02:19 AM

Financial Times

splat
2/5

Anthony Quinn

Jeremy Podeswa's tremulous adaptation of Anne Michaels's novel aches with earnest intent and tasteful eroticism, yet it moves as heavily and lugubriously as a prison gate.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 02:10 AM

Independent

splat

Allan Hunter

Restrained, worthy and dull.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 29 2009 02:00 AM

Daily Express

tomato
3/5

Matthew Turner

Engaging, well acted and ultimately moving drama.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 28 2009 03:15 AM

ViewLondon

tomato
3.5/5

Joseph Proimakis

mia ap' tis pio entimes, katharies ki eilikrineis synaisthimatikes istories poy mporeis na petyheis sto pani, i opoia an hanei kapoy, einai sti dynatotita tis na sikosei to baros ton filodoksion tis

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | May., 14 2009 03:25 AM

Movies for the Masses

tomato
3.5/5

Simon Weaving

take a dip into this thoughtful and intimate portrait of a man slowly warming to the beauty of life as he shakes off the ghosts of a family lost in the Holocaust.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | Apr., 04 2009 06:26 AM

Screenwize

tomato
6/10

Nora Lee Mandel

A sentimental journey through inheriting loneliness and sadness from fathers to sons, and their female fantasies, relieved by beautiful language and cinematography.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | Dec., 07 2008 08:00 AM

Film-Forward.com

tomato

Louise Keller

This is a film whose mood lingers.

Full Review Source: | comment Comment | Dec., 01 2008 03:15 AM

Urban Cinefile

 
 
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Latest News for Fugitive Pieces

April 22, 2008: Based on the acclaimed 1996 novel of the same title, Jeremy Podeswa's heartfelt drama is a personal work that also draws on his family's Holocaust experience. Opens in new window
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March 25, 2008: Trailer & Poster review Opens in new window
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