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Features: DVD
One of the most universally acclaimed films of the year, Before Night Falls appeared on over 75 "Ten Best" lists and features Academy Award® nominee Javier Bardem in a "mesmerizing and inspired performance!" (Rex Reed, The New York Observer)
Julian Schnabel (Basquiat) directs this incredible journey through the life and work of the late Cuban poet Reinaldo Arenas. Victimized by a government that banned his books and jailed him for a crime he didn't commit, Reinaldo endured unspeakable persecution in a courageous stand against censorship and oppression. Without a country but not without integrity, he fled to America where he continued to fight for personal expression and produced a stirring body of work.
Featuring a dual performance by Johnny Depp, Before Night Falls is a tribute to the liberating power of art… and one man's undying passion for life.
"Extraordinary!" Peter Travers, Rolling Stone
"A masterpiece!" Guy Flatley, Interview
"A triumph for Javier Bardem!" Lou Lumenick, New York Post
"Spellbinding!" Jan Stuart, New York Newsday
"The best film of 2000." Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times
Editor's Note
The life of Reinaldo Arenas, an exiled Cuban homosexual writer, is chronicled in an adaptation of his memoir BEFORE NIGHT FALLS, directed by Julian Schnabel (BASQUIAT). Javier Bardem (in an Oscar-nominated performance) portrays Arenas as he journeys from poverty to university to the sexual revolution and homosexual subculture in Havana to persecution and imprisonment under the policies of Fidel Castro for being both gay and a writer. Despite the harsh conditions of prison, the courageous Arenas continued not only to write but also to publish his works abroad. Ultimately, he was allowed to leave Cuba for America, but there he faced new struggles as a man without a country battling AIDS. Schnabel's beautifully filmed sophomore directorial effort captures the essence of Cuba during the revolution. Johnny Depp is featured in the dual supporting roles of the cross-dressing prison inmate, Bon Bon, and the brutal officer, Lieutenant Victor. A well-disguised Sean Penn appears as Cuco Sanchez. Olivier Martinez as Lázaro Gómez Carillo and Andrea Di Stefano as Pepe Malas deliver standout performances. The film received accolades at the 2000 Venice and Toronto Film Festivals.
| Features | Cast & Crew Bios | | Theatrical Trailer | | DVD-ROM | | English Subtitles | | Spanish Subtitles | | French Subtitles | | English 5.1 Surround Dolby Digital | | English 2.0 Stereo Surround Sound | | Spanish Audio | | Feature Length Commentary Including Julian Schnabel | | Original Documentary | | Widescreen Version |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: New Line |
| Release Date: 2/8/2005 |
| Running Time: 133 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2000 | | Catalog ID: 5251 | | UPC: 00794043525124 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English [CC], English, Spanish Dubbed | | Available Subtitles: English, French, Spanish | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | 1.85:1 |
| Cast & Crew
| Awards |
Oscar (2001) | | | Javier Bardem, Nominee, Best Actor | |
Golden Globe (2001) | | | Javier Bardem, Nominee, Best Actor |
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| | Professional Reviews | Premiere
"...[A] powerful true story....Viscerally evocative..." 12/01/2000 pp.24-26USA Today
"...[Javier Bardem] gives an undeniably dynamic performance....[Penn and Depp's cameos] are brief and well-integrated..." -- 3 out of 4 stars 12/21/2000 p.4D Entertainment Weekly
Ranked #5 in Entertainment Weekly's "Owen Gleiberman's BEST MOVIES OF 2000" -- "...[Bardem is] marvelous and moving..." 12/22/2000 pp.106-17 Sight and Sound
"...Lushly beautiful..." 06/01/2001 p.39-40 Hollywood Reporter
"...Ambitious, stylistically audacious and intelligent....A complex and rewarding film..." 10/17/2000 p.20 Los Angeles Times
"...Redolent of atmosphere and rapturously cinematic, BEFORE NIGHT FALLS has a gift for creating visual mood that's so strong you'd swear it couldn't last -- but you'd be wrong..." 12/22/2000 p.C2 Chicago Sun-Times
"...Schnabel, the painter, makes his screen a rich canvas of dream sequences, fragmented childhood memories and the wild Cuban demimonde inhabited by Arenas and others who do not conform..." 02/02/2001 p.29 Salon.com 10 of 10
Before Night Falls is such a vivid experience that it holds you fully in each moment... from scene to scene there's no telling how painter-turned-director Julian Schanabel, or his wonderful star, Javier Bardem, will tackle what comes next... in confidence and sensuality [the movie] suggests the calm that can come with fever, that heightened and slowed state of awareness where each perception and sensation takes on a vibrant clarity. - Charles Taylor
The New York Times 9 of 10
Like a deathbed dream it leapfrogs through Arenas's life, reconstructing crucial moments as a succession of bright, feverish illuminations... the film deliciously evokes pre-Castro Cuba as a sensual endless summer of hot pliable flesh and lapping turquoise waters... [the movie] doesn't give us Arenas's life as he actually experienced it, it offers penetrating glimpses into his life as he may have dreamed it. - Stephen Holden
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