| | | There's no room for honesty in a healthy relationship...
Features: DVD, Pan and Scan (TV Format), Widescreen, Hi-fi Stereo, Dolby Surround Sound, English, French, Spanish, Subtitled, Trailers
Two girls and a guy meet during their experimental college years and engage in a menage a trois. The encounter ends amicably enough, with a couple pairing off, and eventually the three go their separate ways, only to reunite 10 years later. Over the course of a weekend at the Hamptons, they are forced to confront the true meaning of love and commitment.
"The cast radiates integrity and intelligence, none more so than the superb Ruffalo." Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
Editor's Note
Writer-director Austin Chick's first feature film is almost two films rolled into one. The dark, grainy first half with its choppy style introduces would-be filmmaker Coles (Mark Ruffalo), mild-mannered Samantha (Maya Stange), and self-destructive Thea (Kathleen Robertson). Coles meets the two friends at a Sarah Lawrence College in the early 1990s, and the three spend a night together that is ultimately awkward. But Coles and Samantha seem to have found true love, and the couple embarks on the kind of tempestuous relationship so common during the college years. The brighter, more conventionally shot second half of the film--which is also imbued with more comic relief--is set ten years later. Coles works in advertising and is in a stable relationship with Clare (Petra Wright), Thea is happily married and a successful restaurateur, and Sam has just returned to New York City from London having broken off her engagement. With their past love affair looming in the background, Sam and Coles are both forced to confront the past and the future, and to make some tough decisions about their lives. Chick's debut is an interesting experiment in style and structure.
| Features | Audio: English Stereo Surround | | Subtitles: English, Spanish | | Widescreen And Fullscreen Versions | | Interactive Menus | | Scene Selection |
| Technical Info
|
Release Information
| | Studio: MGM |
| Release Date: 2/13/2007 |
| Running Time: 91 minutes |
| Original Release Date: 2003 | | Catalog ID: 1004693 | | UPC: 00027616887436 | | Number of Discs: 1 |
Audio & Video
| | Original Language: English | | Available Audio Tracks: English [CC], English | | Available Subtitles: English, Spanish | | Video: Color |
Aspect Ratio | | 1.85:1/4:3 |
| Cast & Crew
|
| | Professional Reviews | USA Today
"...Some moments in XX/XY ring true, and the honesty exposed is revelatory..." 04/11/2003 p.8EEntertainment Weekly
"...Emotional presence and a sophisticated understanding of commitment-phobia distinguishes this intense, contained drama, as does the unforced, sensual cinematography of Uta Briesewitz..." 04/18/2003 p.47 Chicago Sun-Times
"...Ruffalo plays the character with that elusive charm he also revealed in YOU CAN COUNT ON ME..." 04/25/2003 p.39 Movieline's Hollywood Life
"...In XX/XY, Mark Ruffalo shines..." 07/01/2003 p.121 Total Film
"...Here is a character study that's well written, fascinating and played by one of the most interesting actors working today..." 11/01/2003 p.103 Sight and Sound
"...XX/XY offers a shrewd New York reworking of the kind of subject matter of which French cinema traditionally excels..." 12/01/2003 p.60 Uncut
"Excellent, thought-provoking love triangle drama....Austin Chick keeps it sparky and twisting like a fish, always a jump ahead of you." 09/01/2004 p.138 San Francisco Chronicle 8 of 10
XX/XY, though made by Americans, is a romance very much in the French style, something that writer-director Austin Chick acknowledges with a soundtrack of French songs and a screenplay rife with sensitive, soul-searching conversations. - Mick LaSalle
Chicago Sun-Times 9 of 10
One review of this film complains that all of the characters are jerks, and asks why we should care about them. Well, jerks are often the most interesting characters in the movies, and sometimes the ones most like ourselves. XX/XY would be dismal if the characters all behaved admirably. But the writer and director, Austin Chick, knows too much about human nature to permit that. The film has a rare insight into the mechanism by which some men would rather pursue happiness than obtain it. - Roger Ebert
|
| |
|
|
|
