Beautifully filmed and edited by Bessai to take us into the mind of a man who has made too many life-changing decisions.
Comment
03/16/04
Emile (2004)
57
%
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:23
Fresh:13
Rotten:10
Average Rating:5.8/10
Runtime: 1 hr 33 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Accomplished British actor Sir Ian McKellen stars in this Canadian picture as Emile, a 65 year-old man torn apart by memories of his troubled past. Consumed by guilt over abandoning his family when... [More]
Starring: Ian McKellen, Deborah Unger, Tygh Runyan
Reviews for Emile
Technical shortcomings aside this is a good story well told, elevated by McKellen on top form.
05/22/04
Top CriticReminds us that Sir Ian McKellen is used to playing more complex characters than Gandalf or Magneto.
05/11/04
Top CriticAn honest and intelligent look into real relationships, impressively original in its execution and breathtakingly remarkable in its delivery.
07/20/04
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01/26/06
Top Critica film of tender hues, quiet intensity and elegiac melancholy that you may well find lingering in your own memory.
05/22/04
It's appropriate that the director calls this the final chapter in a trilogy about struggling with one's identity -- he shows none of his own while mishandling someone else's.
03/03/05
A small but excellent cast supports McKellen in what is a beautiful and intelligent film.
03/30/04
A routine memory piece about long-buried family secrets that bubble back to the surface to wreak havoc.
03/04/05
Top CriticSensitively played but ultimately undone by its unconventional approach.
03/04/05
McKellen and Unger do a wonderful trudging through the dirt (and, finally, cheese), Emile never quite gets off the ground.
12/27/04
The films of Carl Bessai are remarkably similar on two fronts: (1) They all have a single name for a title -- first Johnny, then Lola, now Emile; and (2) They just aren't getting much better.
06/04/04
Sir Ian McKellen is at his tweediest and most persnickety as the title character in Emile, the portrait of an eminent scientist who returns from England to his homeland, Canada, to receive an honorary degree from the University of Victoria.
03/03/05
Top CriticEmile may not be flashy, it may even be hard slogging emotionally, but it has value.
02/11/04
It's ultimately more simplistic and contrived than provocative.
02/04/05
Tenderly touches our emotions.
03/04/05
McKellen is superb as usual, and even if it's all a bit pat, the film quietly generates enough emotional momentum to be genuinely moving.
02/11/04
...the sort of prototypical movie that one expects from a made-in-Canada production...
02/11/04
Poignant and well acted, though not very memorable.
02/17/05
At heart a reverie, a meditation on the past and its treacheries, the ways in which people become flawed, and the eternal though often elusive possibility of forgiveness and redemption.
02/03/05
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