My Father and I (2002)
Runtime: 1 hr 40 mins
Genre: Dramas
Starring: Michel Bouquet, Charles Berling, Natacha Regnier, Amira Casar, Hubert Kounde
Screenwriter: Jacques Fieschi, Anne Fontaine
Producer: Philippe Carcassonne
Composer: Jocelyn Pook
DVD Info
Release:
Jul 27, 2004
DVD Features:
- Region 1
- Keep Case
- Widescreen
Additional Release Material:
- Trailers - 1. Original Theatrical Trailer
Interactive Features:
- Scene Selections
Buy It On DVD
Reviews
Vet French actor Michel Bouquet renders such an astounding performance that he elevates Anne Fontaine's family melodrama way above its Freudian foundations and male menopause.
Hushed but scalpel-sharp drama, a movie that'll probably send men in the audience home much quieter than they arrived.
Brilliantly and pitilessly dissects a father-son relationship that has deteriorated beyond dysfunction.
Whether writer-director Anne Fontaine's film is a ghost story, an account of a nervous breakdown, a trip down memory lane, all three or none of the above, it is as seductive as it is haunting.
Watching these two actors play against each other so intensely, but with restraint, is a treat.
A chilly, brooding but quietly resonant psychological study of domestic tension and unhappiness.
This is a fascinating film because there is no clear-cut hero and no all-out villain.
How I Killed My Father would be a rarity in Hollywood. It's an actor's showcase that accomplishes its primary goal without the use of special effects, but rather by emphasizing the characters -- including the supporting ones.
This is a harrowing movie about how parents know where all the buttons are, and how to push them.
Trademark American triteness and simplicity are tossed out the window with the intelligent French drama that deftly explores the difficult relationship between a father and son.
The film is about the relationships rather than about the outcome. And it sees those relationships, including that between the son and his wife, and the wife and the father, and between the two brothers, with incredible subtlety and acumen.
It's a tour de force, written and directed so quietly that it's implosion rather than explosion you fear.
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by: kenporules 7/27/04


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