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Movies / Upcoming / Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait
Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait

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Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait (2008)

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Reviews Counted:18

Fresh:11

Rotten:7

Average Rating:6.1/10

Rated: Not Rated

Runtime: 1 hr 33 mins

Genre: Sports/Recreation

Theatrical Release:Oct 24, 2008 Limited

Synopsis: Follow one of the greatest soccer players of the modern era for a full 90-minute match between Real Madrid and Villareal. Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parenno exquisitely train 17 different 35mm... Follow one of the greatest soccer players of the modern era for a full 90-minute match between Real Madrid and Villareal. Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parenno exquisitely train 17 different 35mm cameras on one of this century's most creative athletes, Zinedine Zidane. While cameras capture Zidane in "real time," Gordon and Parenno's artfully crafted debut feature is anything but a typical sports movie.

Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait is a rigorous and elegant update to the art of portraiture. In today's media-saturated world, relativity reigns over objectivity, and the division between personal and public realms often blurs. Gordon and Parenno show an awareness of the interconnectivity of all things and develop a subjective portrait of Zidane that seamlessly integrates his physicality, his internal world of memories and sensory perceptions, and his relative place in the media landscape.

In Gordon and Parreno's film, the soccer field becomes an almost unworldly place, a universe of its own unhinged from any conventional sense of soccer but profoundly integrated with Zidane's intimate visions and an athlete's phenomenal performance.
--© Sundance Film Festival [More]

Director: Douglas Gordon, Philippe Parreno

Director: Douglas Gordon, Philippe Parreno

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Reviews for Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait

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Full Review Source: Boston Phoenix | comment Comment
04/23/09
Jeffrey Gantz
Jeffrey Gantz
Boston Phoenix

In moments of stillness, a composition of fast jukes and stutter-steps delight the eye. It's a lot of hurry-up and wait at first, but well worth it come the film's finish.

Full Review Source: Boxoffice Magazine | comment Comment
10/27/08
Matthew Nestel
Matthew Nestel
Boxoffice Magazine

You learn little by way of hard facts about the adored French soccer star and famous head-butter Zinedine Zidane in the formalist exercise that bears his name.

Full Review Source: New York Times | comment Comment
10/24/08
Manohla Dargis
Manohla Dargis
New York Times
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

To see everything boiled down to one man’s stillness and movement is a transcendentalist high, a concentrated dose of poetry in motion.

Full Review Source: Time Out New York | comment Comment
10/22/08
David Fear
David Fear
Time Out New York

He's set apart not only as the piece's sole subject but because he's hyper-alert, continually responding to invisible forces, raptly focused on events beyond the frame.

Full Review Source: Village Voice | comment Comment
10/22/08
J. Hoberman
J. Hoberman
Village Voice
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

An overblown nearly-real-time documentary-cum-"art installation."

Full Review Source: Slant Magazine | comment Comment
10/21/08
Bill Weber
Bill Weber
Slant Magazine

Alternately hypnotic and irksome.

Full Review Source: Boston Globe | comment Comment
05/04/07
Mark Feeney
Mark Feeney
Boston Globe
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

Watching a single athlete for the duration of a game is an interesting concept, but Zidane is better in theory than in execution.

Full Review Source: Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema | comment 1 Comment
02/12/07
Mark Pfeiffer
Mark Pfeiffer
Reel Times: Reflections on Cinema

There's more filler than real action (much like any soccer match, in my opinion) and the film is a challenge to get all the way through for anyone without an interest in the game or Zidane himself.

Full Review Source: Film Threat | comment 1 Comment
01/25/07
Mark Bell
Mark Bell
Film Threat

The remarkably intimate camera work gives viewers the sense of being at this very big, very fast athlete's elbow throughout the 90-minute battle.

Full Review Source: Minneapolis Star Tribune | comment Comment
01/19/07
Colin Covert
Colin Covert
Minneapolis Star Tribune
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

It mesmerises yet it also bores. It’s a fascinating experiment and a frustrating film.

Full Review Source: Time Out | comment Comment
10/28/06
Dave Calhoun
Dave Calhoun
Time Out

Strangely enjoyable.

Full Review Source: BBC | comment Comment
10/28/06
Digby Lewis
Digby Lewis
BBC

The stuff between goals can be agonizingly dull, but the film’s sensory impact is heightened by Mogwai’s menacing score and Darius Khondji’s dazzling cinematography.

Full Review Source: eye WEEKLY | comment Comment
10/28/06
Jason Anderson
Jason Anderson
eye WEEKLY

It's both a revelation and a simple confirmation of everything you've ever believed, and an incredibly powerful, deeply emotional experience.

Full Review Source: Cinematical | comment Comment
10/28/06
Martha Fischer
Martha Fischer
Cinematical

This 17-camera portrait of the artist as an ageing star still captures the magnetism and balletic genius of a player whose reputation will surely survive the naysaying of holier-than-thou commentators following his World Cup 2006 dismissal.

Full Review Source: Empire Magazine | comment Comment
10/28/06
Patrick Peters
Patrick Peters
Empire Magazine

Zidane's charisma accumulates and the film becomes a hypnotic experience to which you must simply abandon yourself.

Full Review Source: Guardian [UK] | comment Comment
10/28/06
Peter Bradshaw
Peter Bradshaw
Guardian [UK]

Absolutely hypnotizing.

Full Review Source: Planet Sick-Boy | comment Comment
09/14/06
Jon Popick
Jon Popick
Planet Sick-Boy

The World Cup-winning god of French soccer, Zinedine Zidane, is brought crashing to the ground in Philippe Parreno and Douglas Gordon's ill-conceived documentary Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait.

Full Review Source: Hollywood Reporter | comment Comment
05/26/06
Ray Bennett
Ray Bennett
Hollywood Reporter
Top Critic Icon Top Critic

For that narrow cross section of auds passionate about soccer and experimental cinema, docu Zidane, A 21st Century Portrait will rep a masterpiece; for everyone else, pleasure will vary.

Full Review Source: Variety | comment 1 Comment
05/25/06
Leslie Felperin
Leslie Felperin
Variety
Top Critic Icon Top Critic
 
 
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