Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Usamah Harvey The film's masterful storytelling did its job. The message was clear. No need to overdo.

Janae Milner Easily the biggest piece of Right wing non sense propaganda I ever saw.

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Vihren Mitev Well, the things of life are not always like this, neither are exactly like this. Maybe for its time this movie was something like documentary and representative for the decade but now it seem to me more like utopia and idealistic. I hurry to tell you why.Most important, seen from south-eastern point of view the look over the man is strained a lot. He with capital "h" who is not clear with himself is being waited by his wife and son and his newly beloved. Almost deified. And he, in this time he is self-willed and frivolous...From there on you know what this movie is about. The positive which I want to note is the approach including dreams while he is in coma. The viewer is being rose to the role of a shaman who is asked to interpret them. So, I leave to you the interpretation while I continue with my next critic of ideas in a movie.http://vihrenmitevmovies.blogspot.com/

zipperaugo Above all the memories, there is one with a definite form... mostly in the Love we take to our graves. This love becomes the wellspring of our final images- our reconciliation with longings and regrets. Les Choses De la Vie is centered around a tragedy, an automobile accident.Shot in dazzling slow motion and multiple camera angles, the accident is the Spine on which the Book of Michel (Michel Piccoli) rests. A lot has been mentioned about the simplicity of the story but it is the construction and arrangement of plot elements that leaves a lump in one's throat.A cast that boasts a combined filmography of everyone from Fellini, Tavernier, Antonioni and Demy to Chahine, is the Coup that director Sautet landed. The Film opens with shots of a car in flames, the victim, witnesses and bystanders. The accident is reconstructed in parallel with Michel's life. He is a man of means, a successful architect on the verge of moving to another country. His young mistress Helene(Romy Schneider)wants a house on an island unused by others unlike the one owned by his wife Catherine. Catherine (Lea Massari)is also a colleague who has her own lover. The first hint of searing emotion involves the mention of a favorite family dog, the last the family had. Michel's son Bertrand immerses himself in inventing motorized circuitry that can replace pets in people's homes. What's left between father and son except gratuitous enquiries? This thread is picked up to show a conflict between Michel and Helene at a restaurant. Will Michel chose a vacation with his son over Helene's pressing need to leave the country? Life's like a corvee to work and only a 'young wine that rarely travels' can make up for 32 years of friendship changing for a woman. Michel's love is questioned even as he acknowledges Helene's Physical hold on him. An especially evocative scene involves the engine and the road.. the only true sounds in a difficult silence as they drive back from a party. The lines are pithy and loaded with identity. Sample this.... "You love me 'cause I'm here. You'll be lost if you cross the street." Michel drops Helene off and journeys on, perhaps on an adventure. He has nothing to say because he's still clutching on to civility. The rain brings it all on, the music soars. Michel is lost in his reminiscences. A flood of sweet memories borne from pain, released to counter a new heartache. He tries to undo the showdown with Helene... in solitude, in bitter pain. He tries to explain it in a letter but leaves it unmailed.Self reproach drives him to make a futile call. The rest of the film moves on the light,airy wings of Philippe Sarde's music score. The background assumes various shades as we ride along, passing by a joyous nuptial celebration and culminating in the horrific minutae of the wreck; pulverized steel and a man's life overturned in 5 seconds. The final few frames are like a surreal homage to Michel's being. His subconscious rises as the car burns... a faint murmur to leave behind Life's damages. The victim is like a caged animal, open to interpretations from onlookers. He must resolve to stay awake even as an innocuous Priest chants the last rites. His mind is awake but people can't tell. Regret alarms his soul and brings him back to consciousness, if only for a while. It's not the pain, no mortality can stop a longing soul. But this where the Inner Voice capitulates to the legerdemain of shifting shapes in a dream. The voice rises but once. "...not to live alone," it says. "The Musician has fallen asleep" and the deep gush of the Ocean takes over. P.S. 'The Song of Helene' has an ethereal quality... almost like a fragile Cosmic Thread that holds Michel back on Earth.

writers_reign ... a few of My favourite things are the films of Claude Sautet such as Cesar et Rosalie, Vincent, Francois, Paul et les autres, Nelly et M. Arnaud and The Things Of Life, the film that marked both a change of direction and a maturity in Sautet's career. The premise is hardly original; a man is involved in a car crash and as he nears death his life flashes before him. In other hands this could be maudlin, gauche, embarrassing or all three but writers like Jean-Loup Dabadie (who worked with Sautet on two of the exceptional films he made with Yves Montand, Cesar et Rosalie and Vincent, Francois, Paul et les autres) and directors like Sautet don't do maudlin, gauche, etc and as if the technical credits weren't enough we have actors like Michel Piccoli and Romy Schneider to put the icing on the cake. This is one that stands up to repeated viewings.

manuel-pestalozzi This is one of the few movies in which I thought I detected a stroke of genius. At the core of it is an automobile accident, filmed from many angles, in close up, from a distance, in slow motion, with natural sound, with music. Then the whole story up to the crash is sort of rewound and played again, interspersed with flashbacks in the flashbacks. As I write this, it all sounds very technical, abstract and arty, but in fact it is deeply poetic. I am someone who is quick to say French movies are generally overpraised, but here everything works so well, is so painstakingly beautiful. Nobody should regard it as spoiler when I tell here that the main character dies in the end – but what a way to go! I can specially recommend this movie to people who like to get off their tobacco habit. All characters smoke continuously, you will get a sore throat without lighting a single cigarette yourself.