Search - 8 Women on DVD

French Femmes Fatales Find the Funnybone in F Sharp

DMK | Long Beach, California | 09/19/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Go see this movie and don't wait until it is remade into a bad American version This is a delightful, go for broke, silly film, that allows its cast and the audience to have a great time at the movies. How often does French cinema treat its audience to a cast that includes some of France's most glamorous leading ladies (Deneuve, Huppert, Ardant, Beart)doing full on slapstick comedy and song? 8 women, trapped in a mansion during a snowstorm in the 1950's, find the master of the house dead. All 8 women are suspects, and are guilty of secrets, as well as digging up the dirt on one another, mud slinging, insult hurling and then singing their hearts out. One of the characters may be guilty of murder, and we learn that they all had motives....Production values are high and attention to detail in costumes and sets are noticeable with an effort to reproduce the images of Technicolor films of the 50's. Isabelle Huppert is a show stealer as the bitter spinster sister Augustine to Catherine Deneuve's Gaby. Director Francois Ozon inspires great performances and manages to pull off a pretty quirky idea. I loved this film but I suppose it is not for everyone. If you are up for a well made French comedy that is a little twisted with sharp witted writing, then sit back and enjoy this French bonbon. Don't worry about the subtitles. You will be laughing so hard you will forget you are reading them. Fun web site shows trailer and clips of songs and much more"

A Musical Extravaganza....oh yeah, and murder, too.

Christopher Cook | Plymouth, MN United States | 01/29/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"What a surprise and delight it is to see a movie like "8 Femmes." Having seen this movie a bit ago in the theater here in Minneapolis, I have to say that I was thoroughly impressed with it. A fan of Francois Ozon, I was at first apprehensive about it, most likely due to the emotional scars I still have after seeing "Sitcom," but "8 Femmes," is not like that film at all, and is in fact, like no other movie Ozon has made so far. The shining light of the film lies in the performances of the actresses, which can only be described as a meeting of the who's who of French actresses. Deneuve, Huppert, Beart, Ledoyen, Sagnier, and the others really create a film that is not only fun, but keeps us entranced and motivated to finally see "whodunnit." This is certainly a great example of how a movie can be both entertaining and fun without a lot of action. The dialogue is witty and sharp, the sets and costumes a great throwback to the film noir mysteries of the 50's. The musical numbers only add to the fun. Albeit silly, they seem to fit in place and add a great deal more charm to the overall film.It is a bit disappointing, though, to see that the US DVD release is not going to be getting the extravagent treatment that the DVD release in France got. I recently picked up the deluxe edition of the French release, which contains the movie, an extra disc packed completely full of special featurettes, cast interviews and more, a disc with a peformance of the play that the movie is based on, and the soundtrack on CD. Now, if only a release like that would come to the US...."

Hot House Roses

MICHAEL ACUNA | Southern California United States | 09/22/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

""8 Femmes" is a deftly directed, vulnerable as a rose in a windstorm, touching as a sunrise, homage to women directed by Francois Ozon.
The film is populated with the who's-who of France's film world: Darrieux, Deneuve, Ardant, Beart, Huppert. As a contrast it would be as if Spielberg directed a film with: Roberts, Pfeiffer, Stone, Taylor, Sarandon. Thus, "8 Femmes" is eye-poppingly studded with Stars and therein lays a lot of its charm and success.
So what of the film itself? Well, it's an over-the-top who-done-it very much in the mold of George Cukor's "The Women." But whereas Cukor "opens-up" Claire Booth Luce's stage play to make it more like a film and not a filmed version of a play, Ozon does not.
In fact, Ozon closes "8F" with the entire cast standing in line and taking a bow as if it were a stage play; thereby reinforcing, rather than moving away from the artifice of a stage play.
At the films opening, Gaby (Deneuve) is confronted with the murder of her husband seemingly by one of the other 7 women ,as the house is snowbound: no one can come in or out. In reality this sounds an awful lot like an Agatha Christie Mystery like "10 Little Indians" rather than a Douglas Sirk melodrama like "Imitation of Life," which some have suggested. What strikes me as similar to a Sirk movie, is Ozon's attitude towards his women characters: their situations are absurd and silly but they themselves are not. And it is this humanist view of women that suffuses this film with Ozon's obvious love and admiration of women.
Much is revealed on a personal and social ,through dialogue circa 1950's France, level by all the characters which is the nature and style of a play: the characters say a lot but "do" little. And all manner of women from the maid through the maitresse of the house is equally represented...a 2002 ,not a 1950's take on things.
Francois Ozon's "8 Femmes" is a valentine of a movie dedicated to the various-ness, the ambiguity, the power of women. That it was made in France does not diminish its impact nor Universal appeal to everyone."

Favorite Film of 2002....

arminius | Morrisville, NC USA | 02/14/2003

(4 out of 5 stars)

"...but I don't know why. The color (color!!) and the sets and the style and the flow of the story, along with striking performances, all add up to something much more than the sum of the parts. I rationally analyze every film I come across--have had 4 hour conversations (lectures) on movies like Mulholland Dr--yet can't explain the hold this film has on me. I wonder if others who have seen it might feel the same way? The DVD has no extras, which I was ok with because I was just happy to have it released in the US at all. The only reason the rating is not 5 stars is the unusually intrusive subtitles, which are placed too high in the frame and (strangely) cannot be turned off. They often obscure details one wants to see, like mouths in close-up shots. If this was a lesser film, if the visuals weren't so compelling and the acting performances so mesmerizing and fun, one wouldn't care so much about losing these details. Maybe if you haven't seen it in the theater, you won't be bothered by it as much....."