Delicacy (La délicatesse) (2011) |
BUY IT |
General | Extras | ||
Category | Comedy |
Main Menu Audio Interviews-Cast |
|
Rating | |||
Year Of Production | 2011 | ||
Running Time | 104:54 | ||
RSDL / Flipper | No/No | Cast & Crew | |
Start Up | Menu | ||
Region Coding | 4 | Directed By |
David Foenkinos Stéphane Foenkinos |
Studio
Distributor |
Transmission Films |
Starring |
Audrey Tautou François Damiens Bruno Todeschini Mélanie Bernier Joséphine de Meaux Pio Marmaï Monique Chaumette Marc Citti Alexandre Pavloff Vittoria Scognamiglio |
Case | Amaray-Opaque | ||
RPI | ? | Music | None Given |
Video | Audio | ||
Pan & Scan/Full Frame | None | French Dolby Digital 5.1 | |
Widescreen Aspect Ratio | 1.85:1 | ||
16x9 Enhancement |
|
||
Video Format | 576i (PAL) | ||
Original Aspect Ratio | 1.85:1 | Miscellaneous | |
Jacket Pictures | No | ||
Subtitles | English (Burned In) | Smoking | No |
Annoying Product Placement | No | ||
Action In or After Credits | No |
Back in 2001, a beautiful young French actress, Audrey Tautou took the world by storm as the lead in a beautiful and whimsical French film, Amelie. In the ten years since, she has starred in a number of French films including A Very Long Engagement and Priceless plus co-starred with Tom Hanks in The Da Vinci Code. One of her more recent films is Delicacy or La Delicatesse, which is now being released on DVD by Transmission Films. This film is the debut feature by brothers, David & Stephane Foenkinos. The screenplay is based on a bestselling novel, both written by David, and the film was co-directed by David & Stephane. The film received French Cesar nominations for best debut feature and best adapted screenplay.
This is a sweet and gentle film about love, loss and moving on. Nathalie (Tautou) is a program seller at a theatre who falls in love with Francois (Pio Marmai) who she meets in a cafe. He asks her to marry him and she gets a career job, working for a Swedish company in Paris. Just when she seems to have her life sorted, her husband is killed by a car whilst he is out running. She is obviously devastated but decides to focus on her job to get over her grief. Three years later she is successful and rising in the company, but still cut off emotionally. Her boss, Charles (Bruno Todeschini), makes advances to her which she resists. One day, one of her team, Markus (Francois Damiens), a dorky Swedish guy walks into her office to discuss one of the cases they are working on. She walks over a kisses him passionately, seemingly without thinking. He is immediately smitten with her, she thinks nothing of it. Will Markus be able to get inside Nathalie’s wall of grief and bring her back to life?
This is a lovely film, entertaining, thoughtful, emotionally resonant and life affirming. It is well directed and written by the new filmmakers involved and well acted by the leading couple. The romance is well handled and believable. The story is sweet and romantic but also realistic. The lightness of touch in the way the grief and death are handled makes this a lesson to other filmmakers, especially those on the other side of the Atlantic to France. The original music by Emilie Simon is beautiful and light, portraying emotion but never over-playing it.
A lovely, sweet and gentle romance which will be enjoyed by lovers of fine cinema.
The video quality is good.
The feature is presented in a 1.85:1 aspect ratio which is the original aspect ratio. It is 16x9 enhanced. It is probably worth noting that the case incorrectly advertises a 2.40:1 aspect ratio.
The picture is reasonably clear but a little on the soft side, even for DVD. Shadow detail is good.
The colour is quite good but this is not a film which bursts with colour.
There is a some mild grain at times and a little blocking here and there along with some fairly obvious motion blur.
There are subtitles in English which are clear and easy to read. They are burned into the print.
Sharpness | |
Shadow Detail | |
Colour | |
Grain/Pixelization | |
Film-To-Video Artefacts | |
Film Artefacts | |
Overall |
The audio quality is very good.
This disc contains a French soundtrack in Dolby Digital 5.1. The sound is quite front focused.
Dialogue seemed easy to understand and clear throughout.
The music by Emilie Simon, both score and songs are lovely, significantly adding to the feel of this gentle film.
The surround speakers were used for mild atmosphere at times such as a rain storm and the subwoofer supported the music mostly.
Dialogue | |
Audio Sync | |
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts | |
Surround Channel Use | |
Subwoofer | |
Overall |
The menu featured music but not scene selection capabilities. The chapters are mostly just 10 minute blocks.
A short subtitled promotional interview with Tautou who talks about the story and her character. The subtitles seem to be a very direct translation so suffer from English grammar challenges at times.
NOTE: To view non-R4 releases, your equipment needs to be multi-zone compatible and usually also NTSC compatible.
This film is available on Region 1 DVD and includes a making of featurette in addition to the interview. According to Amazon, however, the video has been cropped to 1.78:1 but this is pretty minor. There is also Blu-ray versions available in the UK and US. In terms of DVD, lets just call it a draw.
The video quality is good.
The audio quality is very good.
One small extra.Video | |
Audio | |
Extras | |
Plot | |
Overall |
Review Equipment | |
DVD | SONY BDP-S760 Blu-ray, using HDMI output |
Display | Sharp LC52LE820X Quattron 52" Full HD LED-LCD TV . Calibrated with Ultimate DVD Platinum. This display device is 16x9 capable. This display device has a maximum native resolution of 1080p. |
Audio Decoder | Built into amplifier. Calibrated with Ultimate DVD Platinum. |
Amplification | Marantz SR5005 |
Speakers | Monitor Audio Bronze 2 (Front), Bronze Centre & Bronze FX (Rears) + Sony SAW2500M Subwoofer |