My Mother's Castle
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Didier Pain, Julien Ciamaca, Nathalie Roussel, Philippe Caubère, Thérèse LiotardBrand: Sony
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono; French (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround; English (Dubbed), Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono
Format: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.85:1
Running Time: 98 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2002-11-05
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Movie Reviews of My Mother's Castle
Movie Review: Part two of Marcel Pagnol's childhood memories brought to film by director Yves Robert is a feast for the eyes and the heart,
Summary: 5 Stars
"Le Chateau de ma Mere" (My Mother's Castle) continues the autobiographical story of Marcel Pagnol's near-idyllic childhood in Provence in the optimistic years immediately before the First World War. It's a chronological sequel to the first instalment "La Gloire de mon Pere" (The Glory of my Father), and although "Chateau" stands as a fine piece of cinema in its own right, it's best seen after you have viewed the first film. Both films are superbly directed by Yves Robert.
In this second film, the family arrange to spend every weekend in their idyllic holiday home, returning to Marseilles every Monday evening as Augustine (Marcel's clever and enigmatic mother) manages to fix it through an influential contact for her husband to start his teaching work on Tuesdays instead of Mondays.
At the insistence of an appreciative former student of Marcel's Papa who now has a job as a minor official on the canal, the family are given a key to all the doors along the canal path and so shorten their four-hour walk from the end of the tram line to the country home by half. This is borderline illegal, as the path technically leads through the grounds of various chateaux and so trespasses on private property- a major sub-plot leading to new friendships, much principled and moralistic soul-searching and one bitter encounter which serves to illustrate differing attitudes of generosity and malevolence found in human nature (needless to say, the author of their misfortune eventually gets his come-uppance in a humorous and satisfying denouement).
The rites-of-passage element of the story includes Marcel's obsession with a pretentious and eccentric girl (and her even more pretentious and eccentric parents), which for a time estranges him from his younger brother and his friend-from-the-wilds Lilli - until he sees the error of his ways and returns to the more wholesome values of his own family.
These films are beautiful, rich and life-affirming, spiced with humour. The stunningly beautiful landscape, the intelligent script, the meandering plot-line, the finely observed period details recalling that long-lost age of innocence, the quirks and eccentricities of the main characters (particularly the male adult leads) make for a first-class cinematic experience which lingers long in the memory. Beware you will need a strong emotional constitution watching the final scene. Voiced-over by the now-adult Marcel, it is so heartbreakingly poignant as it reflects on the fleeting nature of human life and the passage of time that it brought tears to the eyes of some in my family - no mean achievement, I can tell you. If you don't yearn to visit the hills of Provence after seeing these films, there's little hope for you!
Summary of My Mother's Castle
MY MOTHER'S CASTLE - DVD MovieThe second part of Yves Robert's filming of Marcel Pagnol's childhood memoirs completes the narrative so casually begun in My Father's Glory--and fulfills a radiant journey we hadn't even realized we'd embarked on. Marcel is approaching his teens and acquiring a more coherent sense of the world. Accordingly, My Mother's Castle boasts a more concentrated style and unspools its story over (mostly) the space of one year, as opposed to a dozen. Whereas in the first film Robert had worked entirely with little-known players who simply became Marcel's family, here he calls upon screen veterans Jean Rochefort, Jean Carmet, and Georges Wilson to flesh out sharply ironical figures who loom challengingly on the young man's horizon. Consistent with Pagnol's emphasis on Provençal locations, the focal event of the film becomes the weekly walk the Marseilles-based family makes from the trolley station to their remote country cottage--a quintessentially mundane ritual that comes to be fraught with wonder, delight, and terror. It all leads to a payoff that opens the meaning of the title only as the film is reaching its transcendent conclusion. --Richard T. Jameson
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