Sadly Over-hyped

a film so unique, intoxicating and bizarre that it not only demands another viewing, but is also forgivable as a satirical comedy where the jokes eventually take the back seat.

It is interesting even when nothing much happens, which is for most of its 3-hour running time. Read full review

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

This movie was classified in a recent critics' poll as one of the best 100 films ever made. Though I don't put it on there in fact I liked it enough to classify it as a good one. Immediately after their wedding in church a young couple goes running to live in a barge where the husband is a skipper and navigates on river Seine. The action takes place within the barge most of the time which begins to annoy the wife. There besides they, only live and work a boy and and eccentric mate, Père Jules with his bunch of cats, acted by the great Michel Simon whose performance only by itself could make the film worth to be seen. Tensions between husband and wife begin to arise and turn out soon a bit dramatic as expected. Everything is told in lively images and some unexpected and surprising scenes. A firmly directed movie and well acted.

L'Atalante is one of those films I've heard of a lot in the well respected critics list, as you can see, it's highly ranked in They Shoot Pictures Don't They's list, but I've never known enough about it besides the fact that the director, Jean Vigo, died after making it at age 29. It is a truly unique, poetic and dreamy film and does deserve its acclaim. At the core, it's a film about the differences between men and women and how the frustration and anger of that tension drives them together and apart. It's surprising to see a film from pre-1950s to feature such vulgarities as a picture of a naked woman, the use of the word "pussy" referring to a vagina and frequent references to sex and sexual pleasure. But perhaps I haven't seen enough pre-1950s films to truly judge.The relationship between the main couple, Jean and Juliette, is incredibly passionate, even if the jealousy and worry can seem ugly on them. Their separation during the second half is upsetting and the audience really wills them to be together. While it plays with surrealism and faux- surrealism - such as the ambiguity of the second mate Pere's gender and showing him play a record on his finger that turns out to be the cabin boy playing the accordion - the eccentric side characters, including Pere, bring a special layer to the film, even making it genre breaking with slapstick and musical moments. The second half of the film is significantly better than the plodding first half though, where the cinematography is more creative and features excellent framing with lots of high and low angles, use of reflections and silhouettes which give the film a marvellous texture and adds to the atmosphere. It is a really complex film which I know I won't grasp on a single viewing and analysis but an excellent film nonetheless. 8/10

If you have patience for a black and white foreign film that's seventy years old, that takes you to a world which no longer exists, a honeymoon on the Seine, the young couple attempting to find some romance amid quirky squalor, a sailor's world of work and drink, a place where a bride must learn to shift for herself when her husband fails to understand her need for a little magic, well-this is that film. An actor named Michel Simon essays an eccentric boatman who loves cats, keeps his perhaps-lovers severed hands in a jar, and who loves his old phonograph, steals much of the picture, but the cinematographer swipes even more, with moods of shadows and light hovering around some of the most erotic non-explicit lovemaking ever put on film. Director Vigo's longest film is a challenge to watch, but worth filing in your movie gems library. It is both groundbreaking and heart-warming, intelligent and experimental. L'Atlante is a classic that continues to earn it's status.

Very magical about this film. But one have to be patient because it will not completely manifest itself before the last scene. I literarily got goosebumps and I could feel my heartbeat.I my opinion, the reason so many are disappointed about this is because it's not a page turner. (but neither is Moby Dick or Thus Spake Zarathustra) Seeing old movie for me is much like meditation. What makes this movie great are: the characters and wonderful combination of sound and image, mind blowing at times. My top 10. No doubt about it.