The Republic of Love
|
List Price: Our Price: $3.85 You Save: $16.10 (81%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $3.49 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of The Republic of Love
Movie Review: VERY FINE FILM
Summary: 5 Stars
Adaptations are tough, they can never be completely faithful, but this film does well. We own it and have seen it several times. Much more insight into human nature than a standard formula romance or romantic comedy.Movie Review: An Intelligent Script from a Pulitzer Prize Novelist Delivered by a Top Cast!
Summary: 4 Stars
THE REPUBLIC OF LOVE is yet another fine film from Canada based on Canadian Pulitzer Prize Winner (for 'The Stone Diaries') Carol Shields' novel by the same name, and written for the screen and directed by the gifted Deepa Mehta ('Earth', 'Fire', 'Water', etc). It is a satisfying story about the human boundaries set by/for love and how those 'republics' touch and clash and interact.
Tom Avery (the very gifted actor Bruce Greenwood) was an illegitimate child, raised by a homemaker class as a teaching lesson in how young brides to be should learn the skills of tending house, who has grown up, married three times out of a need for belonging and for being loved, and is currently unattached, making his living as a night talk show host helping the lonely hearts. Into his life steps the beautiful museum curator, currently involved in a Mermaid Exhibition, by the name of Fay (Emilia Fox) who remains single because of her exceptionally high demands for a partner. The two meet, fall immediately in love at first sight, much to their individual surprise, and proceed with a courtship, while at the same time encountering and observing other couples (especially their parents) who seem to hold the winning medals for perfect marriage.
Fay's parents (James Fox is Richard, the father) have just celebrated their anniversary when Richard abruptly decides to leave his wife. Fay runs to her mother's rescue, leaving Tom alone and the apparent brunt of Fay's disillusion of marriage. The changes that occur cause Tom to reflect on his history of marrying too often in unions that have not met with success. How Fay and Tom ultimately resolve the abutments of their personal 'republics' is the part of the story that carries the film.
The entire cast includes some of Canada's finest actors and the film is solidly directed by Mehta. There are aspects that disrupt the flow of the story, the main one being the incessant and very loud East Indian music that seems wholly out of place and is at best distracting (the score was written by Talvin Singh). Mehta also elects to throw in some bizarre cutesy animation at the end that for this viewer cheapens the story. But flaws aside, this is a fine film graced by the presence of Bruce Greenwood and Emilia Fox. Recommended entry from Film Movement. Grady Harp, January 08
Movie Review: Lovely
Summary: 4 Stars
This is a very nice love story that is fairly conventional on one level (love at first sight) but has the more comfortable pacing and luminous imagery of independent films that makes it a bit more original. I hadn't read the novel to be able to make comparisons, but I can see how a lot probably had to be abbreviated. The two leads are excellent. Bruce Greenwood is one of my favorite actors, and it is only because he is so appealing that his character Tom (who has been married 3 times and impulsively falls in love and wants to marry immediately again) doesn't seem like the total suffocating mess he probably would be in real life, and actually seems like someone Fay could feel comfortable with. Also, this film has a woman director--big plus!Movie Review: Meditation on love and marriage
Summary: 3 Stars
Film follows three couples: elderly couple who have spent their lives together without being married, couple that celebrates 40 years of marriage and a middle aged couple in a new relatioship on a crossroads of deciding if they want to get married or not. We learn that relationships are never what they seem to be to the outsiders. What seems to be perfect 40-year long relationship ends up in trial separation and what seems to be uncommited casual relationship ends up in marriage in a hospital death bed. The young couple: a man who has been married and divorced three times and his girlfriend who never had seemingly strong relationship are trying to figure out if the marriage is for them at all. There are some great British actors ogf the older generation in this movie: Edward Fox and Claire Bloom for example, who have aged so much that it is almost impossible to recognize them. I liked the mystic indian music in the movie, but fresh infatuation between two youngest protagonists is too sappy at time. I did find some of the casual sex scenes funny (foot fetish for example).Movie Review: Good, but could've been much better
Summary: 3 Stars
In the spirit of full disclosure, I've not read the book this is based on, so can't compare the two. The movie could've been a very sweet, funny look at love, but is marred by a couple of unneeded fairly graphic scenes (imagination is a wonderful thing), and an odd senile neighbor character I simply couldn't figure out the purpose for. I think the creators of the film probably wanted it to have a quirky, almost fantasy feel to it, but didn't quite succeed. The soundtrack/background music was completely annoying and had no relation to the characters or what was going on, and I found myself wishing there was an option to turn it off. Bruce Greenwood's performance is what makes it watchable. He turns a train wreck of a character into someone deeply appealing and charming, even though Tom is almost impossibly naive and gullible for a middle aged man. Also in the spirit of full disclosure I LOVE his voice and wish he really did have a radio show as my dial would be permanently welded onto that station.
More Movie Reviews:
1 2
1 2