|
|
Tarfumes.com - The Eighth Day
|
List Price: $9.98
Our Price: $74.99
Availability: N/A
Manufacturer: Polygram USA Video
Starring: Daniel Auteuil, Pascal Duquenne, Miou-Miou, Henri Garcin, Isabelle Sadoyan
Directed By: Jaco van Dormael
|
Average Customer Rating: 
|
|
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: VHS Tape
EAN: 9786304488317
Format: Color
ISBN: 6304488319
Label: Polygram USA Video
Manufacturer: Polygram USA Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Polygram USA Video
Release Date: 1998-03-24
Running Time: 118
Studio: Polygram USA Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1997-03-07
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Spotlight customer reviews:
|
Customer Rating:
Summary: A Magical Tale..............
Comment:
This truly is a magical tale which will touch your life & stay with you forever.....
It will make you laugh & it will make you cry - It makes you see things differently & look at life with a different perspective.
This film touched my life - I hope it does the same for you.
Quite simply, it's amazing.
Customer Rating:
Summary: One of the best movies you'll ever watch ...
Comment: ... from the moment you see a character with Down's Syndrome identifying with a tv history of Mongolia, until Spanish crooner Luis Mariano serenades him on a sweet chocolate trip out of time.
I'm glad to see all the good reviews. I thought I was the only American who had ever seen this movie, but apparently it's left its mark on a few others. Auteil is wonderful as always, and Pascal Duquenne is remarkable. I believe the two of them shared that year's best actor prize at Cannes.
Please, please, please put this film out on region 1 DVD!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Would it be too much to ask for a Region 1 dvd release?
Comment: If you have any doubts concerning the power and beauty of this film, simply read the other reviews posted here. Yes, this film trully lives up to that hype and more. But when will they come out with a region 1 dvd release? We here in region one are not all french-hating neanderthals, incabable of accepting beautiful art whilst stuffing our bloated jowels with "Freedom Fries". Ahahaha. Yes, if only we here in 'region 1' could have more wondrous examples such as Georges, (played with unflinching realism by the great Pascal Duquenne) we could have our cold, self-obsessed hearts warmed and opened to the beauty in the world.
I was somewhat expecting a "10 year anniversary edition" to come out here in the year of our Lord, 2007. After all, this film swept the Cannes in '97, and is touted as "the #1 movie in europe". Good enough reason to keep it away from American audiences I suppose. But isn't French Canada in region 1? They could at least put this out for our cannuck buddies in Quebec you'd think? Ah well, such are the times. When filth incessantly rises to the top and is flogged for every last money-grubbing shekel, and beauty and truth inevitably get swept under the carpet and forgotten.
Feel free to comment if you have anything to add to this discussion, or if you know if or when a region 1 release is in the works, thank you, sal.
Customer Rating:
Summary: An extraordinary achievement
Comment: Although being fluent in French is almost a prerequisite to watch this movie, it's something that anyone with an interest in intelligent and emotive drama should see. The direction is for the most part light and sure, with the actors given the opportunity to convey pathos, optimism, pain, and regret without the imposition of treacly sound tracks or hackneyed editing. Hollywood will never be capable of making movies like this, and we can only be thankful that the French invest in their movie industry because periodically it turns out gems like le huitieme jour (which means "the eighth day" - a reference to the Judeo-Christian notion that their god made the world in seven days; on the eighth day he accomplished lesser, flawed, work).
Harry is a classic single-minded salesman whose marriage is in tatters; yet he's not heartless - he's simply become caught up in the rat-race. When he forgets to collect his children from the train station, the shock and remorse he feels is powerfully conveyed and we grieve with him that it's too late. As he drives home his guilt leads him to close his eyes and take his hands off the steering wheel. It's a moment of tremendous pain and occurs sotto-voce so we feel it all the more.
Harry, needless to say, doesn't die. Instead he hits something and thus begins his encounter with Georges, a Downs-syndrome man who is on a quest to find his mother. In reality his quest is to find himself and Harry, though initially reluctant to saddle himself with the responsibility, comes to befriend him.
Of course this is a classic "finding yourself" movie in which Harry discovers humanity through witnessing the travails of Georges. But unlike a traditional syrupy Hollywood movie, there's at best an ambiguous ending. Georges does indeed discover himself, and thereby discovers how great and ineluctable a gap exists between his dreams and harsh reality. While Harry and Georges are eating at a diner, with Georges wearing his sunglasses which effectively disguise his condition, the waitress flirts with him. Georges, an open-hearted soul who is also a man with wants and desires, responds happily... only to be crushed when the waitress sees him for what he is and rejects him brusquely.
Georges' end is shown without sentiment, and is all the more affecting because of the crisp direction and well-considered camera angles. And Harry's grief pushes him to make one last effort to regain the hearts of his children.
The acting is first-class, the direction assured, and the overall treatment of the themes is weighty enough to engage the viewer from first to last, without being over-wrought or histrionic. If you only watch one "foreign" movie this year, make this the one to see.
Customer Rating:
Summary: This is definitely the best movie ever made
Comment: There is absolutely nothing more to say about it.
It's simply the best movie ever made.
If you haven't seen it, you have to.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
