Laurence Anyways (2013)
Average Rating: 7/10
Reviews Counted: 51
Fresh: 41 | Rotten: 10
Passionate and powerfully acted, Laurence Anyways sometimes strains to achieve its narrative ambitions (and fill its three-hour running time), but ultimately succeeds.
Average Rating: 7.2/10
Critic Reviews: 16
Fresh: 14 | Rotten: 2
Passionate and powerfully acted, Laurence Anyways sometimes strains to achieve its narrative ambitions (and fill its three-hour running time), but ultimately succeeds.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.7/5
User Ratings: 1,741
Movie Info
Laurence, a French teacher and soon-to-be-published author, enjoys an intense and mutually loving relationship with his fiancée, Frédérique. But on the day after his 35th birthday, Laurence confesses to Fred that he longs to become a woman, asking her to support his transformation. The film follows the course of the couple's on-again, off-again relationship throughout the 1990s. (C) Breaking Glass Pictures
Cast
-
Melvil Poupaud
Laurence Alia -
Suzanne Clément
Fred Bellair -
Nathalie Baye
Julienne Alia -
Monia Chokri
Stefanie Bellair -
Susan Almgren
Journalist -
Yves Jacques
Michel Lafortune -
Sophie Faucher
Andree Bellair -
Magalie Lépine Blond...
Charlotte -
Catherine Bégin
Mamy Rose -
Emmanuel Schwartz
Baby Rose -
Jacques Lavallée
Dada Rose -
Perrette Souplex
Tatie Rose -
Patricia Tulasne
Shookie Rose -
David Savard
Albert -
Monique Spaziani
Francine -
Denise Filiatrault
Gérante de la créper... -
Violette Chauveau
Élise Voïnitski -
Mylène Jampanoï
Fanny -
Jacob Tierney
Alexandre -
Gilles Renaud
Président du conseil -
Patrice Coquereau
Secrétaire du consei... -
Anne-Elizabeth Bossé
Mélanie -
Anne Dorval
Mathe Delteuil -
Pierre Chagnon
Yves Voïnitski -
Éric Bruneau
Mathieu -
Alexis Lefebvre
Simon Delteuil -
Denys Paris
Roland Bertrand -
Vincent Davy
Pierre Alia -
Vincent Plouffe
Léo -
Manuel Tadros
Propriétaire Arabe -
Alexandre Goyette
Marco de Bellefeuill... -
Antoine Olivier Pilo...
Young Adolescent -
Bronwen Mantel
Antiquaire -
Mario Geoffrey
Truck Driver -
Yvette Thuot
Albert's Aunt -
Jeanne Gionet-Lavign...
Student -
Claude Gasse
Commis du supermarch... -
Clement Deschenes
Barman à l'Ile au No... -
Mark Lambert
Barman -
Francois Sasseville
Academic Man
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All Critics (51) | Top Critics (16) | Fresh (41) | Rotten (10)
Lushly romantic and daringly original.
It's all too much, really, including its 21/2-hour-plus running time. But it's also engrossing, an ultimately tender story of a transsexual's transformation over 10 years and its effect on him and the people around him.
At nearly three hours, it's by turns an extraordinary and exhausting work.
Top CriticPoupaud's quiet moments convey a lofty, poignant introspection, and Clément erupts with grand, if scattershot, furies.
At nearly three hours, it's entirely too long, needlessly padded out with an intrusive interview-framing device.
[Mr. Dolan] perfectly evokes the violating effect of a stranger's scrutiny and the imponderable depths of a lover's gaze.
For every sublime moment the movie has to offer, there's a cinematic dead zone of indulgence that wipes it away, generating a frustrating, occasionally intolerable sit.
Rarely have such issues been explored on screen with such intimacy and complexity, even if some of the quirky details in Dolan's epic feels more unfocused than profound.
Laurence Anyways has the feel of a personal project that got away from Dolan, full of raw, rough-edged drama in desperate need of discipline and refinement.
One can't help but feel that Dolan & Co. go into a bit too much detail re: the changes faced by Laurence...Nonetheless, there has not been as exhaustive (exhausting?) a look into the Trans(gender) experience before.
It evidences a hoarder's bond to moments of extravagantly photographed feeling -- no matter that it's often the same feelings being communicated, over and over.
Laurence Anyways, Xavier Dolan's third film, acknowledges the messiness of transgendered life, and the sizeable gaps between tolerance, acceptance, and actually going to bed with someone.
Dolan, now on his third film, is confident. He takes his time. The movie is long enough and covers a great enough time span that the word "epic" will be thrown at it.
This frequently brilliant epic does more than make us understand the challenges faced by trans people and those who love them - it makes us feel those challenges ourselves.
Laurence Anyways contains a voice so pronounced, and so specific, that Dolan is going to be one to watch for years to come.
Xavier Dolan's refreshing and extraordinary achievement here is fiercely telling a grand tale with the most universal of themes (love), and carefully exempting it from victimization while not avoiding the social issues that surround it.
A nearly three-hour epic, a melodrama writ large, and blessed with a young man's ambition.
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