TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Libramedi Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Ella-May O'Brien Each character in this movie — down to the smallest one — is an individual rather than a type, prone to spontaneous changes of mood and sometimes amusing outbursts of pettiness or ill humor.

gracie28 Gabrielle has fine actors, beautiful camera work and features a detailed look at upper crust French parlor society in the early 1900s. It is also one of the more boring and stifling pictures we've seen in a long time. Huppert is a great actress but she is wasted here. If the director was going to do a Conrad adaptation, the original story needed to be better converted for cinema because it just didn't work. There was incessant, drone-on talking which went nowhere. There was little or no character development. Overall the 90 minute movie felt like three and a half hours, for no payoff. The ending was just truncated and very unsatisfying.

buzzbruin Do not waste your time seeing this horrible movie--I hated the actors the photography the servants the leads EVERYBODY.. The opening sequence was the worst in the history of sub-titles--talk, talk, talk--so much talk you coudnt follow the subtitles! I prayed that the husband would JUST STOP TALKING! I got it- she hated him as much as I did. The idea that this couple would have any kind of meaningful relationship was not possible. I hated the 3 maids and the scenes of their duties. Yeah I get it--in the 19th century women had no legal rights--a key explanation for some of the m Ivie's. There was absolutely no explanation or character development of their 'FRIENDS" One of my rules for any form of drama is to CARE about the people involved--these people should have been taken before a French firing squad asap! The (writing) was non-existent--the only information given was everybody hated everybody. The music was the MOST Inapropriate ever seen in the history of film, unrelated to anything in the plot. This is the most shallow movie in the history of drama--if widely released it would set French films back for 2 decades. The lead actors only talent was to be a boring pompous ass--thus I hated him as much as the role he played. The female lead was LOST--no emotional life--AND not ONE MOMENT OR WORD OF HUMOUR

jim smith This up close study of a marriage in crisis is Chereau at his subtle, rich best. The infant terrible of '82 Bayreuth has matured into a maestro of cinema.Gabrielle wants more but is unwilling to spend the effort or pay the price to get it. Her husband wants less and will settle for nothing less than less. The machinery of their marriage was running so flawlessly that it required no work by either and only modest attention. Their relations were on automatic pilot and they both seemed massively content to keep it that way. Then the machinery, briefly but ruinously, goes crazy.Huppert and Greggory are riveting. And, not counting the credits, run time is less than 90 minutes. Good artistic judgment there by Chereau. Any longer and this film could be painful for the viewer. Jim Smith

R. Nauta (rudymovie) What can one add, after the foregoing comments, ranging from " zero" (Belgium) to " 8 " from some other country. All aspects have already been touched upon, so I will give some other, personal observations. 1. this is a (great) psycho-thriller in the tradition of that Master of theatrical cinema, my hero of the 1970s, Luchino Visconti (like, Innocente, Gattoparde). even the setting was very Viscontesque. But the scenario has weird twists, and an absurd ending. Which made it " a drag" for me in the end. 2. Towards the end of the story, as the woman offers herself to re-find her husband at last (?) and we viewers get to see a glimpse of Isabelle Hupperts pubic hair, not seen since her nude photos in the french playboy Lui, 1981, it is then that we realize that Sexual Frustration is the main theme of the film. So typical in that era. 3. The setting and context are excellent. Far from a " costume drama", the in-house day-to-day scenes are tremendous. Nothing to ridicule about, that 's the way it was . 4.People lacking historical knowledge, as some of the comments indicate, should remember that the upper classes in the western world had this lot of servants in the late 1800s...indeed. 5. I liked the film, but went to it only as a fan of Huppert. Any other actress, I would have " skipped". The payment was great. My appetite for close-ups of her psycho-tormented , and aging !!, face, was satisfied. What great acting talent, compared to a modern woman -of - low- morale, I saw her act last week in My Mother. 6. Actually , she looks like (the late) my mother.....that s why I adore her in the end. OR??