Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
Audience Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Binding: DVD
Brand: Warner Brothers
EAN: 0026359441226
Format: AC-3
Label: Hbo Home Video
Manufacturer: Hbo Home Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Hbo Home Video
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2007-11-13
Running Time: 141
Studio: Hbo Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 2007

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Spotlight customer reviews:

Customer Rating:

Summary: Great Performance but...........
Comment: Marion Cotillard delivers a stunning performance as the great Edith Piaf. She becomes Piaf. Christie Laume, sister of Theo Sarapo, Edith's husband when she passed away in 1963, says on her weblog, Marion captured Piaf sowell; the way she walked, talked, her very character. Being a long time Piaf fan, I was looking forward to seeing this movie. I must say that despite the realism that the director and Cotillard brought to the screen, I was rather disappointed by the focus being primarily on the pain and suffering that was surely part of Piaf's life. In that way the film is rather one dimensional. I was also frustrated by the non-linear chronology; starting out in her final years and moving to her childhood, the film jumps randomly to various periods throughout her life, culminating on her deathbed in 1963. Missing from the story is her stage and movie career, life during Nazi occupied Paris, and marriage to her 2nd husband Theo Sarapo, who was 23 years her junior and which caused quite a stir at the time, it is a story in itself. Although the marriage was only to last a year, she and Theo were happy and the director was looking to show Piaf as miserable, so it didn't fit. That is what disappointed me most, the focus on misery.

The depth of her character is not really explored. She is portrayed as an obnoxious drunk and drug addict who has a passion for singing. She definitely had a drug and alcohol problem and was difficult at times. These are the human frailties and shortcomings that many of us have, but surely there must have been more to her character. When one listens to Edith's recordings and sees her performances (youtube Piaf) one gets the sense and depth of the true artist that she was. She was absolutely one of the greatest singers and performance artists ever. Plain looking, she would become radiantly beautiful during her performances, her face, her hands, her body, would convey joy, sorrow, love and sensuality, she would be carried away by the music and would take the audience along with her.

She was an excellent vocal musician and had a fantastic dynamic range. The power of her voice considering her diminutive size was amazing. Her composers wrote songs with key changes that would be challenging for the average singer. "A quoi ca c'est l'amour" written by Michel Emer for her and husband Theo Sarapo, who performed the number with her, goes through 6 chromatic key changes, the key changing by a half step after each verse starting in Bmaj and ending in Emaj at the final verse. Her timing was impeccable. She mentored and helped launch the careers of Theo, Charles Aznavour and Yves Montand. She collaborated with her composers and wrote the lyrics to La Vie en Rose. This is the work of a dedicated hardworking musician. These dimensions are lacking in this film. I think Edith is deserving of a better treatment than the one she gets in this movie.

Still, I enjoyed the movie and was just amazed by the talent of Marion Cotillard. She has earned a well deserved Oscar as best actress.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Ne Pas de Wire Hangers! Pas de Wire Hangers, jamais!!
Comment: Marion Cotillard one-hundred-and-ten-percent deserved her Academy Award for Best Actress based on her sheer commitment to this role, and for the unwavering belief I had in her performance: I don't know much about Edith Piaf, but from teen to crone, Cotillard's rendition of the script is consistent and enthralling.

A pity, then, that such a talent and such a performance should belong to what is essentially La Mommie Dearest Francaise. "Christina! Apportez-moi la Ax!".

Little Edith's life starts in miserable neglect and ends in neglectful misery... ...oh, and she becomes a famous singer in the middle. The problem with this movie is the screenplay: you know how in a TV miniseries events flash forward from crisis to crisis with no time for emotional development in the middle? That's what happens here. For all its high-fallotin' trappings, "La Vie En Rose" is essentially a pot-boilerish soap opera movie, with little to no character development for anyone but Cotillard - and even then, Cotillard's script ranges from truculent teen to truculent old lady. There's not enough exploration given to any one facet of Piaf's character, or to the possible consequences of Piaf's early tragedies.

And tragedies there are! Early, middle and late life tragedies... ...two whole hours of tragedies! There's one particularly lovely scene where Cotillard's talent is allowed to express something other than fear, rage or sadness: there's a real sense of childlike wonder and mutual adoration when Piaf meets Dietrich - but this scene is atypical, and sadly, scenes like it are in very short supply.

Supporting cast members sort of blend into one after a while: the nicest thing one can say about Depardieu and Jean-Pierre Martins is that the screenplay gives them five sympathetic minutes apiece before they (and their potentially interesting storylines) are dispatched without ceremony, to be replaced with another bout (or twelve) of hardship and shouting. Although Sylvie Testud gives a very compelling performance as Momone, again, we don't get enough of it.

Direction is pretty, nothing unusual and nothing memorable.

The dialogue is alright, too - but sadly seems to consist of a number of set-pieces with no explanation of cause or consequence to create a sense of a fluid narrative.

I needed hiking boots to wade through to the end of "La Vie En Rose". I'm going to get seventeen million unhelpful review votes for this, but I have to call it as I see it. High Art, this is not. It's not a fair-handed retelling of the life of a great artist, and it's not even a particularly well-made movie. Cotillard might be great, but her greatness, along with the rest of the movie, is overwhelming and ultimately hollowed out by its own emotionally unavailable content.

Rent if you're curious.

Customer Rating:

Summary: Perhaps the Finest Biographical Performance In The History of Cinema
Comment: The legendary Edith Piaf (1915-1963) was essentially a street person who possessed little emotional self-control and whose often difficult life included alcoholism, crippling car accidents, drug addiction, and a series of scandals that included accusations of Nazi sympathies during World War II. But for all this, Piaf was a truly gifted artist whose talents ultimately outweighed her tempestuous personality and outrageous lifestyle: her fans, her friends, and her lovers seemed able to forgive anything when confronted with the scope of her vocal gifts. Then as now, she is regarded as the sound of the soul of France.

It would seem artistic and commercial suicide for any actress to play the role of one so well-recalled and so intensely beloved as Piaf--but not only actress Marion Cotillard dare risk it, she is remarkably successful in the role, offering what is easily one of the great performances in cinema history. Once the film progresses beyond Piaf's childhood, Cotillard appears in virtually every shot, making LA VIE EN ROSE extremely dependent on her performance--and she carries it off in every scene. The illusion is astonishing.

The film has an unusual structure, darting back and forth in time between Piaf as a child, Piaf during her final years, Piaf at the peak of powers. (Perhaps wisely, however, director Olivier Dahan and the script carefully excludes mention of Piaf's tendency to party with the Nazis in occupied Paris.) Cotillard makes the shifts with tremendous ease, as does the film itself. The designs and their executions are brilliant from start to finish and you believe in them.

Although the supporting cast is quite good, this is really Cotillard's show, and she does indeed make the most of it. It is hardly surprising that she became only the second woman to win the Academy Award as Best Actress in a foreign language film: she deserved it. The DVD includes a brief "making of" documentary that focuses on Cotillard and her director; the print is excellent, and the sound (which makes use of Piaf's original recordings) is very fine. Strongly recommended.

GFT, Amazon Reviewer

Customer Rating:

Summary: This is the magical performance!
Comment: Yep, this is the one which won Marion Cotillard the British, French and American Academy Awards. She's brilliant, of course, as other posters have noted. But I think Olivier Dahan should have gotten more praise. Remember, when you see him change time periods, that the French already know all about Piaf; she's still a national heroine, so it's not confusing to them, for whom this film was made. They didn't need to see her with Yves Montand, or watch her work in the Resistance. They already knew about that. This, as Cotillard has mentioned in interview after interview, is more a personal and emotional biography. To make my point: Look again at the first Piaf musical hall performance. It's basically a silent film, with wonderful music underneath. We see Piaf's movements, head thrusts, hands on hips -- this goes on quite a while, so when the standing ovation occurs it's almost a shock. This is no slapdash film director we're seeing here....All praise for Cotillard's historic performance, which just can't be faulted. But a little pat on the back for Dahan, too?

Customer Rating:

Summary: 5 stars is not enough for this story of the legendary Piaf
Comment: The story of the legend chanteuse Edith Piaf. Very well done, emotionally satisfying, with a great renditions of her well loved songs, superbly played by Marion Cotillard.

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Editorial Reviews:

Edith Piaf is the subject of La Vie en Rose, director Olivier Dahan's powerful if emotionally redundant biographical film about the iconic French superstar whose life, as depicted here, seems to have been a numbing succession of tragedies interrupted on occasion by artistic triumph. Dahan's portrait begins with Piaf's stay in a brothel as a young girl. Left to the care of her grandmother (who runs the place) after her father pulls her away from a narcissistic mother, Piaf undergoes significant health problems and grows up to sing on the street in lieu of outright prostitution. The film pulses along with the usual biopic rhythms, with pivotal moments in the life of Piaf (played as an adult by Marion Cotillard) turning up regularly only to be smacked aside by the unseen hand of perpetual misfortune. There's the impresario (Gerard Depardieu) who recognizes Piaf's great but raw talent only to have a run-in with the criminal element around her. There's the heavyweight fighter (Marcel Cerdan) who becomes the love of Piaf's life but can't be with her. Drug addiction, random car accidents, tax problems, you name it, it's all here, topped by an unnerving revelation that pops up in La Vie en Rose's final moments. After awhile, with such a concentration of bad news squeezed into 140 minutes, one begins to wish Dahan had taken a more expansive approach to Piaf's life and times. But the film is never less than interesting, and the lead performance by Cotillard is often astonishing. --Tom Keogh