The Apartment
|
List Price: Our Price: $4.31 You Save: $5.67 (57%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $3.41 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of The Apartment
Movie Review: a very french film about love in all its forms
Summary: 5 Stars
The previous reviewer (Lim) did a great job of summarizing without giving anything away. Apparently, I liked this movie a whole lot more. This movie was a classic french love story - no hollywood ending here. The soul of the movie is best explained by Alice, as she is confronted by Max of her duplicity - Haven't you ever felt such love that you were willing to do anything? Love is the real main character. We see idealized love (Max and Lisa), we see obsessive love (almost all of the characters at one point), we see pragmatic love (Max and Muriel & Lisa for Daniel), etc. There is no right or wrong in this tale. According to Nietzsche, anything done out of pure love is never evil. Hmmm.... All types of love are displayed and the ending is most fitting for each character. I believe that Alice's character was the most intriguing as she starts obsessive and grows into true love.
This is one of those rare movies that you can sit back and enjoy simply on a plot driven level or discuss all the different levels of love and what the ending meant. Either way, it's a great way to spend 1.5 hours!
Hollywood re-made this movie (Wicker Park), which was good but nothing like this very french tale. The U.S. version focused more on the obsessive angle and copied many of the same scenes with a Fatal Attraction twist.
Movie Review: Vincent Cassel Was Quite A Leading Man Discovery
Summary: 5 Stars
One facet of this movie that no one mentions but it really is a factor is that two of the actors on the screen are perhaps the sexiest, most magnetic and charismatic stars movie goers have seen in awhile. These two are Vincent Cassel and Monica Bellucci. They made the movie in 1996 and actually married one another in 1999. IMDB lists them as still married. So perhaps the film was helped by this real life sizzling and chemistry. It is difficult to shoot a film involving love, attraction and sexuality if the two actors are absolutely flat with no chemistry between them. This French film involves them as former lovers who cannot find one another again. He does spot her one day and follows her to her apartment. However, when he hides in her apartment, he discovers it is someone who looks like her who lives there. But he was sure he saw her, not this other woman. This is a very nuanced, layered film. Cassel is definitely the lead because the camera is always on him and he is the one who is searching. Just writing about it, I feel another watching coming on! Some have compared this to Hitchcock and De Palma and it is a fair comparison. Truffaut was another Frenchman who paid homage to Hitchcock with THE BRIDE WORE BLACK. This film is like that one in style, elan and suspense.Movie Review: confused and pointless
Summary: 5 Stars
The main thing this film has going for it is the young, and very beautiful, Vincent Cassel. Pretty much everything he does is interesting. But he couldn't save this confused, and confusing, drivel. It pretends to be important and artful but, alas, is neither.
To be fair, the film has some style, but none of the characters comes across as more than superficial, deceitful, given to inexplicable flights of fancy in the name of -- you guessed it -- love. They have some good shags, but that's about it. Nothing too eternal for all their pretenses, feigned nervousness, and ineptitude.
I watched, and fidgeted, all the way to the end just to see if the story was actually going anywhere ultimately. It wasn't.
The only thing that could have saved this film would have been for muscular Vincent Cassel to take off his shirt a lot more. A LOT. Then it would have been Academy material. His character may not be too bright, but he's a genius from the neck down.
Movie Review: One of the best French films of the 90s
Summary: 5 Stars
L'Appartement became an instant favorite when I saw it a few years ago, although on revisiting it I did find myself wondering for a while if I hadn't over-valued it. But then, a third into the picture it takes a sudden left turn and what had been a relatively simple romantic drama about lost love suddenly became a much more complex piece of work touching on the nature of desire and the way accidents of timing and interpretation can change fate.
What's most fun - or most frustrating, depending on how you like your narrative delivered - is the way it doubles back on itself, revealing that the passing details in one person's life can be major ones in another's, even revealing that for the first third of the movie both we and the main character haven't noticed the presence of one key character. Rewarding and exhilarating stuff.
Movie Review: French Hitchcock
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a stunning romance thriller. It breathes like Hitchcock. After watching it I went back to the beginning of the film when the jeweler asked Max (Vincent Cassel) which of the three beautiful rings (how he described them) he will choose. Max will think about it and we find out who he choose at the end of the film. He's not sure about his engagement to Muriel when he overheard the voice of his lost love Lisa (Monica Bellucci). From there on he must find her and find out why she has left him two years ago without a word. He finds clues which may lead him to an unsuspecting surprise. The music and camera work is excellent as you follow the characters throughout and the story keeps you thinking.