FemaleFirst.co.uk: DVD: Enduring Love [DVD] [2004]

Enduring Love [DVD] [2004]
enlarge	Director: Roger Michell Actors: Daniel Craig, Samantha Morton, Rhys Ifans, Alexandra Aitken, Susan Lynch Studio: Pathe Distribution Category: DVD List Price: ~~£19.99~~ Buy Used: £1.88 as of 20/11/2009 21:33 GMT details You Save: £18.11 (91%) New (18) Used (16) from £1.88 Seller: ndking5 Rating: 35 reviews Sales Rank: 6959 Format: PAL, Widescreen Languages: English (Subtitles For The Hearing Impaired), English (Original Language) Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over Region: 2 Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1 Number Of Discs: 1 Running Time: 96 Minutes Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2 Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6 EAN: 5060002833551 ASIN: B0007KVCP0 Theatrical Release Date: 2004 Release Date: April 11, 2005 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days


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Editorial Reviews: Amazon.co.uk Review A red hot-air balloon floating gracefully over the green English countryside leads to a shocking death in IEnduring Love/I, an eerie and hypnotic movie based on a novel by Ian McEwan. Two men tried and failed to help, and afterwards Joe (Daniel Craig, ISylvia/I, IThe Mother/I) finds himself being stalked by the hungry-eyed Jed (Rhys Ifans, IVanity Fair/I, IHuman Nature/I). Like a gangly wraith, Jed follows Joe and begs him to recognize the passionate love Jed feels certain was sparked by the balloon accident. Jed's obsession crawls into Joe's head and his life, clawing at his happy relationship with his girlfriend Claire (Samantha Morton, IMorvern Callar/I, IMinority Report/I) and derailing Joe into an obsessive spiral of his own. IEnduring Love/I builds the taut delirium of a Hitchcock movie. Ifans, best known for his comic performances, curls his tall frame into a seemingly helpless but creepily aggressive shuffle; the haunted eyes of Craig and Morton make the crumbling of their relationship as suspenseful as Jed's stalking. Director Roger Michell (INotting Hill/I, IPersuasion/I) uses fresh, jarring images and sinuous visual rhythms to craft a tight thriller with unsettling emotional layers. I--Bret Fetzer/I

Customer Reviews: Showing reviews 1-5 of 35 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next » We can#x27;t let go of our illusions. January 9, 2006 Bruno 9 out of 10 found this review helpful Condensing 200 odd pages of deep philosophical McKewen themes into a 90 minute film is no easy task, and judging from many of the reviews both online and offline that tend to see this as just as another mediocre thriller about pyschological obsession, one might think that Roger Michell has failed miserably in his task.pBar the ending, the film adaptation certainly follows the Ian McKewan book quite faithfully, with the minor changes that have been made, such as Joe becoming a published academic who teaches his students that love is simply a darwinian trick to get us to copulate, designed seemingly to stress the key issues of the original novel - can man live guided only by a scientific understanding of himself and the world, and would such a life in fact be worth living? pThese conundrums are expressed in the film sometimes a little too obviously to the point of crudeness (the camera zooms in and out of focus from a dazed Jed to a bunch of ripe apples). But the consequences of eating from forbidden fruit of knowledge, the letting go of innocent and empty illusions and the resulting madness and chaos, are brought to life on the whole superbly, especially in the opening of the film, pure McKewen of course, but in Michell#x27;s cinematic evocation of it, simply unforgettable. As Joe lets go of the doctor, the boy and the balloon, just as he has let go of the safe and contented predictablity of everyday faith in the world, its love and its meanings, he discovers that only unpredictable tragedy ensues.pAnd yet this film, a little like the novel, never quite becomes the classic that you feel it could and should have been. Despite this, it remains a well crafted, admirably acted and, so long as you don#x27;t try to understand the apparently confusing plot as a simple thriller, a film with lots of rewarding meaning to extract. "Will you pray with me?" May 7, 2005 M. J Leonard (Silver Lake, Los Angeles, CA United States) 15 out of 21 found this review helpful Enduring Love is all about chaos of love and how we must endure this chaos, in the form of chaotic romantic love, obsessive love, and perhaps also the love of faith. Chaos can suddenly strike at any time to derail love, even in the deceptively calm and tranquil English countryside. How do we survive love even when we don't want it, or even when we do? And, with everything that can and does go wrong with love and in the world, how does love ultimately sustain itself? pThese are complex issues, which director Roger Michell admirably achieves in bringing to dramatic life in this intriguing, thoughtful, and dark psychological thriller. Incredibly ambitious on what was obviously a shoestring budget, Enduring Love is visually arresting, daringly scored, athletically and brilliantly acted, and powered at all times by an unstoppable edgy and uneasy spirit.pThe story opens in a gorgeously serene green field somewhere on the outskirts of London where Joe (hunky Daniel Craig) and Claire (Samantha Morton) have gone for a picnic. Just as Joe's about to pop the cork on a bottle of Champagne when a red passenger balloon drifts near, its basket skipping across the ground. A man suddenly tumbles out and frantically tries to get at the terrified boy still in the basket. pAfter a beat, and the merest of hesitations, Joe and Claire race toward the balloon along with four men, each of whom has come running as though out of nowhere. Amid a flurry of rapid edits and blurred shouts, the five men manage to steady the balloon. Then a strong wind swoops in low and carries the balloon up with the men hanging off the basket. Realizing that they can no longer hang on, four drop to safety, but one tragically falls to his death.pIt's a horrific sight, both for the onlookers and for us. The accident shakes Joe to the core. A university lecturer (although it's never really clear what he teaches), Joe just can't wrap his mind around the pointlessness of the disaster, and while he spends his days sprouting philosophy on biology and love, his nights are filled with violent nightmares and interrupted sleep. He begins to draw balloons on scraps of paper, and stares, transfixed, at oval-shaped vases and red apples, repeatedly insisting to Claire that they could have saved the man. pWhen Jed, (an extremely creepy Rhys Ifans) who was one of the other men hanging off the balloon, calls, Joe responds with a kind of harried inquisitiveness. He seems pulled to the idea of another witness, but there's something about Jed that leaves Joe uneasy - perhaps it was Jed's insistence that they both pray next to the body. For Jed, the accident came as a revelation of divine love, and possibly another kind of love, since he can't leave Joe alone, and can't stay away from his house. pJed suddenly turns up when Joe is having lunch with a friend, and later when Joe is lecturing in the classroom. Jed begs Joe to reciprocate his feelings and to spiritually acknowledge the divine will of the accident. While Joe continues to view the accident with a kind of detached and disconnected cynicism, Jed becomes even more passionate and stalker-like, and as Joe's relationship with Claire steadily begins to unravel, Jed ratchets up the urgency and supplication, eventually turning into a kind of scorned lover and fully-fledged psychopath. pWhat is so terrific about this movie is the way that Roger Michell captures the grief and helpless rage of those who witness calamity about which they can do nothing. All the protagonists are powerless to help as the terrified man hangs by a rope, high atop the field. But more importantly, Mr. Michel manages to convey quite brilliantly, the universal theme of sexual longing, which constantly courses throughout the film - Claire and Jed both want Joe, who is too distracted and differently unavailable to both of them. pJoe, godless, has lost sense of the world, and when he's faced with Jed's profoundly spiritual reaction to the accident, he finds his suppositions about love and life gradually falling apart. The ensemble cast are a joy to watch with the lanky and loose-limbed, Mr. Ifans as Jed suitably unkempt and creepy with his fine flaxen hair that occasionally brushes into his eyes. But is it Daniel Craig who is the true standout as Joe - with his lean, sinewy body, piercing blue eyes, and restless physicality. Craig fits the role so beautifully that you actually believe in his crisis and that his spirit is irrevocably troubled. pA huge and unpredictable emotional force continues to build through this film, and while none of the characters imbue that much sympathy (they're all wine swilling psuedo-intellectuals with bad table manners), the audience will be weirdly convinced that all three of these people are right, even though each of their positions have significantly switched by the picture's end. pNervy and complex, Enduring Love constantly teases the boundary between reality and hallucination. Is Jed just a part of Joe's psyche, a figment of his imagination? The viewer never really knows until film's end, and by then, love in all its forms has definitely and undeniably endured. Mike Leonard May 05. A thought-provoking and perfectly performed piece of work. May 22, 2005 Jonathan James Romley (Dublin, Ireland) 15 out of 21 found this review helpful Having never read Ian McEwan's original novel from which this film is based, I can't rightly judge whether or not this was a successful adaptation. However, I can say that as a standalone work, Enduring Love is one of the more interesting films to be released within the last couple of years and, as a successful British film, is one to rank alongside other recent UK successes like Dead Man's Shoes and Vera Drake. Having watched the film a couple of times, I was left with the urge to go away and discover McEwan's original novel (as was the case when I saw the film adaptation of his other key-work, The Cement Garden), as the film, although highly interesting and emotionally engaging, certainly left me asking a lot of questions.pThe opening scene really sets the mood and pace (and of course, the plot) for the rest of the film... not to mention standing as one of the most exciting, engaging and downright jaw-dropping moments of visceral, cinematic tension-building that I've seen in a long time. Here, director Roger Michell juxtaposes the lush greenery of the Oxfordshire countryside - with it's rolling hills and vast, ocean-like sky - with a billowing, blood red, hot-air-balloon, waving as dangerously as the frantic, hand-held cameras that capture the action. The editing is punchy and creates a rhythm that works towards heightening the confusion felt by the characters, as the quiet, countryside picnic of writer/professor Joe and his sculptress girlfriend Claire is disrupted by the sight of the balloon, and the appalling tragedy to come. As the story progresses, the couple try to put the event to the back of their minds and carry on as normal with their comfortable, bourgeois lives of luncheons, dinner-parties work-related accolades, however, when another one of the witnesses to the event contacts Joe out of the blue, we see the beginnings of a bizarre and dangerous relationship that will push all three protagonists beyond the regular boundaries of reasonability.pSome have likened the film to something like Fatal Attraction, with the idea of obsession and guilt both featuring as central to both... however, for me, Enduring Love was much more of a treatise on the nature of love, and the whys and wherefores of such. For example, it is important to note that Joe is a professor who studies the nature of love, and the human qualities one would require to endure love, when, in reality, it is the unhinged and unwanted fellow witness Jed that really understands the true sense of blind obsession, so central to such feelings.pThe style of the film manages to be both low-key and visually distinctive, with Michell employing a style similar to his previous film, The Mother, with hand-held cameras that offer a reality - but also, manage to convey the wavering uncertainty and voyeuristic intrusion so central to the plot - coupled with staccato editing, optical filters, rich composition and an extraordinary use of locations (all captured in glorious 2:35.1 widescreen). The performances are of an extremely high calibre as well, with Daniel Craig bringing a smug-pomposity, but also a vulnerability to his role of the logical professor pushed to an illogical limit, whilst Samantha Morton offers support as the bewildered Claire, who has to question Joe's mental stability as he begins obsessing about the accident and his newly acquired "friend". However, much more impressive, if only for the fact that he delivers a performance completely against every other role I've ever seen him attempt, is Rhys Ifans, who embodies the lonely and perhaps somewhat disturbed Jed with a quiet, contemplative spirit that goes against the kind of melodramatic, raving lunatics found in similar, Hollywood endeavours.pThe interplay between the three characters is wonderfully handled by Michell, who paces the film deliberately, so that the relationships only becomes truly apparent over a gradual period of time. Now, this may infuriate some viewers who expect a much quicker film that gets straight to the point, but I for one admired the gradual build and felt that it made the relationship between Joe and Jed much more metaphysical (bringing up all kinds of questions about fragmented personalities, two-halves of the same soul, repressed guilt, angst, sexual frustration and schizophrenia), whilst also forcing us to question who is really insane? This is just one question that the film left me with as the credits began to roll, with Michell and screenwriter Joe Penhall leaving a lot of minor-details unresolved, thus, allowing the audience to fill in the blanks. Again, this may annoy some viewers... and I must admit, I myself was left scratching my head on a number of occasions (not least, the scene that takes place after the final credits), but having gone back and watched the film a second time you realise that so much of the emotional background and the character motivation is there in those great performances.pIt's certainly a film that will leave you with something to think about, if not only the relationship between the characters, then certainly the rationality of them leading up to that tense, edge-of-the-seat final. For me, Enduring Love was a great film that kept me interested throughout and left me with a lot of questions that have been running through my mind over the last couple of weeks. I appreciate the fact that a lot of viewers seek some kind of emotional resolution from a film, but I feel that people who don't necessarily expect every single loose end to be neatly tucked away by the end credits - or those that enjoy thinking about both the characters and the story once the film has come to a close - will certainly enjoy and appreciate this. Hauntingly good film February 12, 2007 Ms. Amy Hunt (Oxford, UK) 7 out of 10 found this review helpful At first I heard that Rhys Iffans was in it and that he starred opposite Daniel Craig (hunky sex god!) and that got me interested in the film. br / br /After seeing James Bond I knew it was going to be good! I was rather cynical when I first saw it but if you see it a second time like I did, it gets a little more sense and familiarise with the Enduring love theme. br / br /It captured me from the start, the balloon being tugged away by the wind or whatever force it was, and the point of the film, all about the first to hold on and not letting go. The obsession that haunted Joe, the balloon and not making sense of it and the obsession that Jed had for Joe. br / br /Brilliantly acted by both actor leads, and the support from Samantha Morton, has made a big impact on me. It teaches you about how you endure love, and the other side of it, the madness/obsession/the pain of the love as well. Very well done Brilliant! Really, really exceptional! September 11, 2007 J. Smith (Derbyshire, England) 2 out of 3 found this review helpful This really is a fantastic film. It really helps a lot if you haven't read the book. I read the 'Eragon' book shortly before going to see the film, which was a big mistake, because all I could do throughout the film was make comparisons to the book and make negative comments. I have now, after watching it a few more times, learned to like the film. I feel it could be the same for this film. It's a brilliant film with superb performances from Daniel Craig, Rhys Ifans and Bill Nighy (BEST ACTOR EVER)! br / br /The book-to-film transition may not have been great, but as a film it's still excellent! A really good thriller sure to have you discussing for hours afterwards. Be prepared people...this is what we call a 'good film'. Showing reviews 1-5 of 35 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Next »

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