I Am David
by Paul Feig
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Ben Tibber, Hristo Shopov, Jim Caviezel, Joan Plowright, Silvia De SantisDirector: Paul Feig
Brand: LION'S GATE ENTERTAINMENT
Writer: Paul Feig
Producer: Andrea Borella
Producer: Clive Parsons
Producer: Davina Belling
Producer: Lauren Levine
Producer: Plamen Voynovsky
Writer: Anne Holm
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0; Spanish (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 90 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2005-04-05
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: Lions Gate
Movie Reviews of I Am David
Movie Review: Tibber Shines, Does Bulgaria Proud
Summary: 5 Stars
I'm glad I came late to this film. NORTH TO FREEDOM, as this film was released in America, is one of the best in quiet, deeply moving European-style film. Young 12-year-old David (Ben Tibber), presumably Jewish, escapes from a Russian concentration camp in Bulgaria, where he's lived most of his life. Jim Caviezel (Johanes) is his friend and teacher who takes the blame for a minor offense committed by David. When Johanes is shot for the offense, David escapes.
A rucksack with David's ID papers, a knife, bread and a compass awaits him outside the gulag. On his adventures, he braves the ocean to sail to Italy, befriends an Italian sailor among others...and meets Sophie Anderson (the great Joan Plowright) near the Swiss border. Sophie, a kind English (presumably) lady, takes David in not long after his near-animadventure with a generous Italian family.
Throughout the film, David keeps seeing a book that attracts him deeply. Sophie finally discovers that David is the main subject of the book--written by David's mother. The gulag, run by an old friend of David's mother's, was a sort of protective place for David. At the agreed time, everything was arranged by the gulag Captain for David's escape. It is his voice, not the assumed Caviezel, that we hear overlapping certain points of action. It is the gulag captain, not Johanes, who has instructed David to prepare him for his escape. With Sophie's help later on, he is flown to Copenhagen, Denmark to meet his mother.
I love this film mostly because, like the great Russian film IVAN'S CHILDHOOD, it centers on a courageous young boy finding his way through war-torn countryside. Tibber is absolutely delightful, and one cannot help but fall in love with this child and long for him as a son.
The tremendous presence of Joan Plowright really moves this film along at a quickening pace. I was saddened that it seemed suddenly cut to the end, a mere 90 minutes--as if they had run out of money and said, Time to go home. The others hand in splendid performances, though, like all such films, they are what I call "significant near-cameos". Still worth seeing.
What you will not get here is lots of backstory; I'm still not sure whether these gulag people were Jews or general enemies of the Soviet state. Also it is difficult to place most of the character's cultural background, except of course the Italians and Russians. A bit sad, since Americans tend to like to know whom they are watching in film. Europeans are much less interested in that, and more interested in interpretation of mood and situation.
Get it and appreciate what is there...you will never be sorry to have this gem in your collection.
Summary of I Am David
I Am David is adapted from Anne Holm's internationally acclaimed novel North to Freedom. David is thrust into the free world for the first time in his young life as he travels across Europe. It is a spiritual voyage of discovery where David slowly loses his instinctual mistrust of humanity and begins to smiles share trust and ultimately love.System Requirements: Running Time 90 MinFormat: DVD MOVIE Genre: DRAMA Rating: R UPC: 012236149606 Manufacturer No: 14960Similar DVD Movies
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