| Product Summary | | Publisher: Tla Releasing | | Format: DVD | | UPC: 00807839002171 | | Buy.com Sku: 40723617 | | Item#: V2635X | | Buy.com Sales Rank: 25216 | | Category Keywords: Sex Theatrical Release | Rating:  |
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| | | A Film by Christophe Honore Based on a Novel by Georges Bataille.
Features: DVD, Widescreen, Aspect Ratio 1.85:1, French, English, Subtitled
The incomparable Isabelle Huppert (The Piano Teacher, I Heart Huckabees) once again provokes and enthralls in this vivid character study of a modern woman testing the boundaries of life's pleasures and pain. Pierre (Louis Garrel, The Dreamers) has come to the Canary Islands to stay with his mother Helene (Huppert), but after his father's death it becomes clear that there are too many things the teen doesn't know, and his mother is committed to ensuring her son's education. At once sexually charged, romantic and frightening, director Christophe Honore's uncompromising adaptation of Georges Bataille's posthumous novel is a brave journey into dark, uncharted areas of the human soul, guided by one of the screen's great actresses.
"Powerful, uncompromising cinema." BBC Online
"Astonishing. Isabelle Huppert is fearless." Dennis Dermody, Paper
Editor's Note
Adapted from the provocative novel by transgressive postmodern intellectual and author Georges Bataille, MA MERE is set in the visually lush and spiritually empty tourist trap of the Canary Islands. Louis Garrel, projecting the same European sultriness that was perfectly suited to Bertolucci's more warmly erotic film THE DREAMERS, plays Pierre, a sulking and antisocial teenager, willfully indifferent to being on summer vacation with his parents. When his wayward father suddenly dies, his mother Helene (Isabelle Huppert), forces him into her universe of illicit sex--a simultaneously ugly and playful realm inhabited by Gallic sophisticates engaging in orgies and bondage. Pierre, a devout Catholic, is resistant at first--to the point of Catholic guilt-induced attacks of sobbing and hyperventilation. But after fulfilling experiences with Helene's male and female playmates, Pierre obsessively pursues the sexual attention of his own mother, and a disturbing quest toward consummation of the attraction between mere and fils is undertaken.Star Isabelle Huppert's role as Helene is a perfect follow-up to her award-winning turn in the equally shocking LA PIANISTE, which featured the French fatale engaging in illicit acts with both a young male student and her own controlling, elderly mother. With her just barely constrained and visibly volatile sexual energy, the actress has become known as the "go-to girl" for roles that transcend sexual and social taboos and explore the dark and violent side of erotic desire. Her overpowering presence in MA MERE, as all great performances do, make the viewer wonder just how blurry the boundaries between actress and role have become.
| Features | Alternate Ending | | Audio: French Dolby Digital Stereo | | Deleted Scenes | | Interactive Menus | | Interviews With Director Christophe Honore & Actress Emma De Caunes | | Original Theatrical Trailer | | Scene Selection | | Subtitles: English |
| Technical Info
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Release Information
| | Studio: Tla Releasing |
| Release Date: 2/19/2008 |
| Running Time: 102 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2005 | | Catalog ID: 141 | | UPC: 00807839002171 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: French | | Available Audio Tracks: French | | Available Subtitles: English | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | Anamorphic Widescreen 1.85:1 |
| Cast & Crew
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| | Professional Reviews | DVD Verdict 9 of 10
Reviled by just about everybody upon its release, I found a lot to admire in Christophe Honore's controversial film, which is essentially 2005's equivalent to Bernardo Bertolucci's The Dreamers. The two films actually have a lot in common: not only does Louis Garrel star in both films, but there's a similar preoccupation with incestuous relationships and subversive sexual behavior...Yes, there's lots and lots of nudity in Ma Mere featuring both sexes, and just as much sex--some of it arousing, most of it deeply disturbing. For a number of viewers, I imagine that these elements are the film's main selling points. But really, there's a lot of other things going on behind Ma Mere's sexually charged surface...There's probably no other actress working right now who could have pulled off the role of Helene, la mere of the title, besides Isabelle Huppert...For all the things that I liked about the film, it's still a failure somehow. It seems to aspire to be a Claire Denis film--to attain that same visceral depth and vibrancy, that almost physical intensity that saturates her films (I can hardly begin to imagine the things she would do with this material). But even though Ma Mere does ultimately fail--fail to transcend the titillation factor and become the intellectual film it aspires to be--it's never anything less than interesting. - Jesse Ataide
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