Films de France
filmsdefrance.com    Your online guide to French cinema

L’Amant (1992)

Dir: Jean-Jacques Annaud         Drama / Romance       stars 3
Overview
L’Amant is a French romantic film drama first released in 1992, directed by Jean-Jacques Annaud.  The film is based on a novel by Marguerite Duras and stars Jane March, Tony Leung Ka Fai, Frédérique Meininger, Arnaud Giovaninetti and Melvil Poupaud.  It has also been released under the title: The Lover.  Our overall rating for this film is: good.


L'Amant poster
Synopsis
Indochina, in the late 1920s.  A young French girl leaves her impoverished mother and brothers and returns to the boarding school where she will soon complete her studies.  On the way, she encounters a rich and handsome Chinese man – their instant attraction is mutual, and very intense.  She becomes his lover, but he cannot take her as his wife, for it is not permitted for him to marry outside of his caste.  The girl’s mother sees an opportunity to extort money from the Chinese man for the benefit of her sons.  Refusing to play the part of a prostitute, the girl goes her own way, but continues her passionate affair with her Chinese lover...


Film Review
L’Amant is a sensual big budget adaptation of Marguerite Duras’s internationally successful biographical novel of the same title (winner of the prestigious Prix Goncourt in 1984).   The film has the exceptional glossy production values that we have come to expect of Oscar-winning director Jean-Jacques Annaud – lavish period sets and evocative photography in one of the world’s most beautiful locations.  Visually, the film is stunning and provides an authentic portrait of 1920s Indochina.    Where the film is perhaps lacking is in conveying the innermost feelings, thoughts and motivations of the characters involved in the drama.  Everything is on the surface, the protagonists feel too impersonal, and consequently the film feels detached, sometimes cold, even superficial.   Too much is left to Jeanne Moreau’s sultry narration of Duras’s exquisite prose to supply the essential human dimension which seems to be missing elsewhere.   In any event, L’Amant is an engaging film, a beautifully composed portrait of a turbulent young love in a foreign climate.

© James Travers 2007

Write a review for this film...


User Comments
What do you think of this film?

Related links
More French Drama
More French Romance
Recent DVD releases






Credits
  • Director: Jean-Jacques Annaud
  • Script: Jean-Jacques Annaud, Gérard Brach, Marguerite Duras (novel)
  • Photo: Robert Fraisse
  • Music: Gabriel Yared, Frédéric Chopin
  • Cast: Jane March (The Young Girl), Tony Leung Ka Fai (The Chinaman), Frédérique Meininger (The Mother), Arnaud Giovaninetti (The Elder Brother), Melvil Poupaud (The Younger Brother), Lisa Faulkner (Helene Lagonelle), Xiem Mang (The Chinaman’s Father), Philippe Le Dem (The French Teacher), Ann Schaufuss (Anne-Marie Stretter), Jeanne Moreau (Narrator)
  • Country: France
  • Language: French
  • Runtime: 115 min
  • Aka: The Lover


 
Home   |    Film index   |    Write to us   |    Guestbook   |    Discover France   |    DVD Shop

Copyright © filmsdefrance.com 1998-2012