- Actors: Michel Piccoli, Christine Pascal, Michel Aumont, Gérard Jugnot, Arlette Bonnard
- Directors: Bertrand Tavernier
- Writers: Christine Pascal, Bertrand Tavernier, Charlotte Dubreuil
- Producers: Michel Piccoli, Louis Wipf
- Format: PAL
- Language French
- Subtitles: English
- Region: Region 2 (This DVD may not be viewable outside Europe. Read more about DVD formats.)
- Classification: 15
- Studio: Universal
- DVD Release Date: 4 Feb 2003
- Run Time: 113 minutes
- Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
- ASIN: B000G8NYG8
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 163,503 in Film & TV (See Top 100 in Film & TV)
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
What we have here is a failure to communicate,
By
This review is from: Spoiled Children ( Des enfants gâtés ) [DVD] (DVD)
Set in a Paris losing its character to office blocks and high-rise or hideous shoe-box housing developments, Des Enfants Gates aka Spoiled Children is pretty much Bertrand Tavernier's rarest film these days - even in France you can only get it as part of a boxed set of his films. It belongs to that curious genre of directorial dissatisfaction that so many European directors fall prey to when they don't know what they want to do but know they want it to be personal so make a film about a director who doesn't know what he wants to do but knows he wants it to be personal. In this case Michel Piccoli is his alter-ego (maybe Noiret was busy?), a director struggling with a screenplay who rents a troublesome Paris apartment to get away from distractions only to become involved with the residents' association's battles with their landlord and falls into an affair with Christine Pascal (who co-wrote the film along with Charlotte Dubreil) that's more a convenient distraction rather than a passion, let alone a commitment.
What we have here is a failure to communicate. While his rarely seen wife (they share no scenes together until almost the end of the film) tries to communicate with children who won't talk, he's thrown into a series of relationships where everybody talks but nobody really communicates with the people they're talking to because they're too tied up in their own worlds: even when having sex they don't look at each other. It's handled with a light touch (one character complains about movies he doesn't see) but at times it's as trite as `Bernard' describes the script he's failing to write about a character who, like himself, risks nothing. Despite highlighting rights of middle-income families who get lost in the cracks between the left and the right, the film is ultimately little more than a directorial self-indulgence - Tavernier even references Death Watch, which he wouldn't make for another three years - but it's not an unpleasant one. And there's the chance to see the male two-thirds of the French comedy troupe Splendid - Gerard Jugnot, Thierry Lhermitte, Christian Clavier and Michel Blanc (the latter's estate agent being the brunt of the film's best joke) - who would go on to huge local success with the Les Bronzes films, as well as a bit part cameo from Isabelle Huppert as a secretary. The French DVD boasts a decent widescreen transfer with optional English subtitles but sadly the plentiful extras - audio commentary by Bertrand Tavernier, 47-minute interview with Tavernier and composer Philippe Sarde, interview with Gerard Jugnot, extract from TV show Pour le Cinema, text of a letter to Jacques Chirac and the original theatrical trailer - are all unsubtitled French.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
3.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews) 1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
What we have here is a failure to communicate,
By Trevor Willsmer - Published on Amazon.com
Set in a Paris losing its character to office blocks and high-rise or hideous shoe-box housing developments, Des Enfants Gates aka Spoiled Children is pretty much Bertrand Tavernier's rarest film these days - even in France you can only get it as part of a boxed set of his films. It belongs to that curious genre of directorial dissatisfaction that so many European directors fall prey to when they don't know what they want to do but know they want it to be personal so make a film about a director who doesn't know what he wants to do but knows he wants it to be personal. In this case Michel Piccoli is his alter-ego (maybe Noiret was busy?), a director struggling with a screenplay who rents a troublesome Paris apartment to get away from distractions only to become involved with the residents' association's battles with their landlord and falls into an affair with Christine Pascal (who co-wrote the film along with Charlotte Dubreil) that's more a convenient distraction rather than a passion, let alone a commitment. What we have here is a failure to communicate. While his rarely seen wife (they share no scenes together until almost the end of the film) tries to communicate with children who won't talk, he's thrown into a series of relationships where everybody talks but nobody really communicates with the people they're talking to because they're too tied up in their own worlds: even when having sex they don't look at each other. It's handled with a light touch (one character complains about movies he doesn't see) but at times it's as trite as `Bernard' describes the script he's failing to write about a character who, like himself, risks nothing. Despite highlighting rights of middle-income families who get lost in the cracks between the left and the right, the film is ultimately little more than a directorial self-indulgence - Tavernier even references Death Watch, which he wouldn't make for another three years - but it's not an unpleasant one. And there's the chance to see the male two-thirds of the French comedy troupe Splendid - Gerard Jugnot, Thierry Lhermitte, Christian Clavier and Michel Blanc (the latter's estate agent being the brunt of the film's best joke) - who would go on to huge local success with the Les Bronzes films, as well as a bit part cameo from Isabelle Huppert as a secretary. The French DVD boasts a decent widescreen transfer with optional English subtitles but sadly the plentiful extras - audio commentary by Bertrand Tavernier, 47-minute interview with Tavernier and composer Philippe Sarde, interview with Gerard Jugnot, extract from TV show Pour le Cinema, text of a letter to Jacques Chirac and the original theatrical trailer - are all unsubtitled French.
3.0 out of 5 stars
BERTRAND TAVERNIER, OPUS 4,
By Daniel S. "Daniel" - Published on Amazon.com
*** 1977. Co-written and directed by Bertrand Tavernier. One nomination for the French César awards (Jean-Pierre Aumont). Note the discussion between Michel Piccoli and Christine Pascal about Piccoli's precedent film called LA MORT EN DIRECT (Death in Full View (La Mort en direct) [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - France ], a movie Bertrand Tavernier will direct 4 years later. Another curiosity for us today is the use by Tavernier of several young French actors who would become local stars in the eighties and nineties like Michel Blanc, Gérard Jugnot, Thierry Lhermitte and Christian Clavier. Finally, you'll find social topics and autobiographical inspiration in this film which is not the best of the French director. A VHS version of this movie can be found here: Spoiled Children.
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