The Story of Adele H.
by Francois Truffaut
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DVD Cover Information
Actor: Bruce Robinson, Isabelle Adjani, Ivry Gitlis, Joseph Blatchley, Sylvia MarriottDirector: Francois Truffaut
Brand: ADJANI,ISABELLE
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Unknown), Dolby Digital 2.0; English (Subtitled); Spanish (Subtitled); French (Subtitled); English (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0; French (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0; Spanish (Original Language), Dolby Digital 2.0
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Letterboxed, NTSC, Subtitled, Widescreen
Picture Format: 1.66:1
Running Time: 96 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2001-01-23
Audience Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Studio: MGM (Video & DVD)
Movie Reviews of The Story of Adele H.
Movie Review: Truly Extraordinary
Summary: 5 Stars
Thirty years later it is hard to imagine "The Story of Adele H" without the then twenty-year old Isabelle Adjani as the title character. But at the time Truffaut's decision to cast the young French theatre star was very risky. Not because there was any doubt about Adjani's acting, but because casting someone who was arguably the most beautiful actress in the world as a character driven mad by unrequited love raised a potential credibility issue. Would viewers believe that the advances of a woman so beautiful, passionate, and intelligent were rejected? And could someone like that elicit sympathy from the average viewer.
But Truffaut knew what he was doing because Adjani's Adele Hugo is 100% convincing. And rather than going for audience sympathy they go for audience frustration as the viewer is increasingly exasperated over Adele's self-destructive behavior. Adjani's breathtaking beauty actually is an asset as Truffaut wants you convinced that the world offers unlimited possibilities for Adele if only she can let go of her obsession. Adjani plays the character with such intensity that you are finally relieved when Adele's madness has reached the stage where she is no longer aware of her own suffering.
Apparently Adele had other issues before going on her obsessive quest for love. Her sister drowned a few years before and her parents had always strongly favored her sister. Adele has recurrent nightmares about drowning. Marriage and her pursuit of Pinson are her only way to escape from her famous father. Truffaut's stays with blacks, browns, and blues; with much of each frame filled with shadows; not exactly dreary but consistent with a character who has found little non-fantasy happiness during her life.
The camera loves Adjani, a good thing as she is on screen for over 90% of the film. She was the youngest nominee ever for best actress. It was the best performance of the 1970's, probably no one but Adjani could have conveyed such inner emotional violence. It is that extremely rare visual performance that does not need subtitles or even sound.
As Roger Ebert noted: "Truffaut finds a certain nobility in Adele. He quotes one of the passages in her diaries twice: She writes that she will walk across the ocean to be with her lover. He sees this, not as a declaration of love, but as a statement of a single-mindedness so total that a kind of grandeur creeps into it. Adele was mad, yes, probably - but she lived her life on such a vast and romantic scale that it's just as well Pinson never married her. He would have become a disappointment".
Then again, what do I know? I'm only a child.
Summary of The Story of Adele H.
A profoundly beautiful movie (The New York Times), The Story of Adele H. is a haunting film based on a true story about desire, devotion...and madness. OscarÂ(r)-nominated* Isabelle Adjani stars in this lush portrait of a woman whose obsessive passion sets the stage for oneof the most romantic films of recent years (Saturday Review). Adele, daughter of French author and patriot Victor Hugo, is beautiful, composed and filled with the same brilliant writing talent as her famous father. However, Adele is driven not by literary aspirations but by love. Impelled by a need that will not be denied, she has run away from home to follow her handsome, womanizing lover (Bruce Robinson) across an ocean to wintry Halifax, Nova Scotia. Wild with desire, she'llrisk everything to renew their brief affair. And if she can't win him back, there'll be a terrible price to pay. *1975: Actress, The Story of Adele H.; 1989: Actress, Camille ClaudelFrançois Truffaut's dramatization of the true story of Adele Hugo, the daughter of French author-in-exile Victor Hugo, and her romantic obsession with a young French officer is a cinematically beautiful and emotionally wrenching portrait of a headstrong but unstable young woman. Adele (Isabelle Adjani, whose pale face gives her the quality of a cameo portrait) travels under a false name and spins a half-dozen false stories about herself and her relationship to Lieutenant Pinson (Bruce Robinson), the Hussar she follows to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Pinson no longer loves her, but she refuses to accept his rejection. Sinking farther and farther into her own internal world, she passes herself off as his wife and pours out her stormy emotions into a personal journal filled with delusional descriptions of her fantasy life. Beautifully shot by Nestor Almendros in vivid color, Truffaut's re-creation of the 1860s is accomplished not merely in impressive sets and locations but in the very style of the film: narration and voiceovers, written journal entries and letters, journeys and locations established with map reproductions, and a judicious use of stills mix old-fashioned cinematic technique with poetic flourishes. The result is one of Truffaut's most haunting portraits, all the more powerful because it's true. --Sean Axmaker
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