Cathardincu Surprisingly incoherent and boring

Dotsthavesp I wanted to but couldn't!

Listonixio Fresh and Exciting

BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.

chrishend I'll start by agreeing with others here that the acting in the movie was very good, Emmanuelle in particular did a great job. The kids even did a good job although at times they were forced to use lines that kids would never say (um, 10ish year-old girl screaming about wanting to get impregnated? Okay ...) Unfortunately, the actors and the scenery were the best things about this movie.While watching the film I simply did not understand why there was a sexual encounter between the mother and the teen boy. There was no buildup, there was no real interest between the characters, it just BAM happened. It came completely out of the blue (although bless you Ms. Beart. I'd loved to have been in that kid's shoes during that scene ...) This relationship that was built up somewhat in the trailer and the advertising made no sense whatsoever. The "love" story in this movie seemed like a complete "Hollywood" style cop-out where a little bit of skin or sex has to be included in any movie about "relationships" to make the mouth-breathing public happy.After listening to some of the interviews on the DVD I was finally able to figure out where the director went horribly wrong. The author of the original book said that in his story the 2 soldiers tried to rape the mother until the teen boy comes out of the blue and saves her. After that she sleeps with him somewhat out of gratitude. That at least sounds plausible.However, the explanation of why she slept with him in the movie ... that the she became lonely after hearing about the soldier talking about going back to his family ... I completely missed in the film. When they brought up this idea in the interviews it felt like I must've been watching a completely different movie.This film introduced the soldiers as potentially dangerous characters, and throughout their scenes we were never led to cast our doubt aside. Therefore the idea of her being so moved by this soldier's story (a soldier that might be thinking of raping her) that her loneliness drives her to have sex with the teen boy (of which she seemingly had no real interest) is laughable. The audience was never led to believe much of anything that left the soldier's mouth, so why should we accept that the mother character would be so moved by it that it would drive her to very suddenly jump the bones of the teen boy? Without the soldiers attempting to rape her, as what occurred in the book, there was never any ultimate resolution between the two world-views of the main characters ... the survival of the fittest mentality of the boy (who was ready to attack the unarmed soldiers with an axe) vs. the living through society/morality viewpoint put forth by the mother. The movie just sort of ended ... If the boy had gone ahead to murder the soldiers there would've at least been some deeper question revealed about how people maybe need to make choices between life/death/killing/stealing/etc when they are forced into the middle of a situation where their lives are in danger. This conflict between world-views, that the movie was seemingly built toward, was completely abandoned and unresolved.

zionforsell I love this movie. As usual of a French movie, it contains a minimal amount of dialogs. The viewer needs to pay attention to their gesture of emotion, not simply hearing it from the dialog. Hollywood movies are too obvious when it tells everything and leave no spot for viewer to interpret. But if you love a movie that's artsy, it's for you! Gaspard Ulliel is brilliant. Bert is excellent too! She really carries on the story well. But Gaspard shines in the role of the upbeat, mysterious teenager. He still maintains that mystery about the character even to the end. THe movie sets in a wonderfully preserved place and sometimes I watch it just to see how beautiful nature is. Essentially, this movie is not about a war, but about human relationships being put into an intimate situation!

dbdumonteil André Téchiné was never part of my favourite French directors."Les égarés" will not make me change my mind.It's certainly a cinema de qualité with polished pictures,good directing.But his movies (and I've seen a lot of them;"Barocco" "les soeurs Bronté" "j'embrasse pas" the ending of which is particularly infuriating)do nothing for me."Les égarés" ,in its first sequences on the road ,recalls René Clément's masterpiece "Jeux Interdits" .Then the scenes in the country far from the war might have been influenced by Louis Malle's "Black Moon" which would have turned "realistic",Yvan replacing the twins. The relationship Yvan/Odile is predictable and provides the low point of the film.The one sequence which reaches something out of the ordinary is when the wunderkind starts singing an operatic aria ,in German,which is all the more disturbing.

Ralph Michael Stein "Strayed" is the second French movie released in the U.S. recently in which fleeing urban refugees seek to outrun the German Army when the so-called "Phony War" turned very real in the spring of 1940. Where "Bon Voyage" combines a serio-comic homicide and some high-strutting portrayals of sundry officials, a movie star, hangers-on and their sycophants, as well as a conventional anti-Nazi plot, "Strayed" is director Andre Techine's finely honed and narrowly focused look at a family trying to survive.Odile (Emmanuele Beart) lost her husband in the early days of the war (he died a hero-a must for any French WWII film). She and her two children, Philippe (Gregoire Leprise-Ringuet), thirteen, and Cathy (Clemence Meyer), about eight, abandoned their Paris home as German forces surged towards the city. Their car was destroyed by a marauding enemy plane and they narrowly escaped death. Trekking into the woods they're accompanied by a mysterious young man, still a teen, Yvan (Gaspard Ulliel), a fellow who seems to have considerable wilderness skills and whose very short hair was not in fashion among young French men at the time. A clue about his past. Yvan is not forthcoming about his pedigree or his recent activities.Yvan breaks into a lovely house abandoned by its owners, classical music performers. Before letting the family in he insures that they will be there for a while by several acts of sabotage.The story unfolds with relationships developing across age and gender lines, not without problems. Philippe befriends Yvan who can be haughty and dismissive of the younger boy, causing the latter pain. Cathy is a genuine, normal for her age pest, the kind who both exasperates and amuses. And the beautiful Odile finds it hard to resist being attracted to their mysterious benefactor who knows how to bring "home" if not the bacon, then the bunny.Unlike "Bon Voyage" there are no anti-Nazi polemical messages here. Technine provides the basic facts: loss of a husband and father, dislocation that, perhaps, was unnecessary (although Odile does remark that she wouldn't collaborate with the invaders), a dark, almost scary at times benefactor springing up from nowhere. Adapting to rapid change in a lush and verdant countryside still largely unmarked by combat is the key.Scenes are shot with mostly close-ups so that the characters' faces relay feelings. Very good cinematography.Technine is a good storyteller and Beart is quietly effective in the very familiar role of "What's a mother to do?" She hasn't resolved the loss of her husband - she still grieves - but she also can't repress her femininity and sexuality. Odile is very believable as are her kids.An impressive French film.8/10