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Flanders
EMAILPRINTInternational Film Circuit, Inc.

Generally favorable reviews
Based on 19 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?
Based on 3 votes
Read user comments
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Movie Info
Genre(s): Action | Drama | Foreign
Written by: Bruno Dumont
Directed by: Bruno Dumont
Release Date:
Theatrical: May 18, 2007
Running Time: 91 minutes, Color
Origin: French (with English subtitles)
Language(s): France
Summary
RATING: Not Rated
Starring Adélaïde Leroux, Samuel Boidin, Henri Cretel, Jean-Marie Bruveart, David Poulain, Patrice Venant, David Legay, and Inge Decaesteker
André Demester shares his time between his farm and walks with Barbe, his childhood friend. He loves her secretly and painfully, accepting from her the little that she can give him. Along with the others his age, Demester leaves home to be a soldier in a war in a far off land. Barbarity, camaraderie and fear turn Demester into a warrior. As the seasons go by, Barbe, alone and wasting away, waits for the soldiers to return. Will Demester's boundless love for Barbe save him? (International Film Circuit)
Also On Metacritic
FILM: L'Humanité Twentynine Palms
Also On The Web: Internet Movie Database View The Trailer Official Studio Site
What The Critics Said
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
New York Post V.A. Musetto
Unspeakable brutality ensues, including a rape, a castration and cold-blooded murder. Dumont never mentions Iraq, but the parallels are clear.
Read Full Review >TV Guide Ken Fox
With very little dialogue and lingering shots of the landscape -- always a very important visual trope in Dumont's deep-psyche explorations -- the film is nevertheless tighter and, clocking in at under 90 minutes, relatively brief.
Read Full Review >Chicago Tribune Michael Phillips
Except for the tractors, and the tanks in the later desert battle sequences, Flanders could be taking place centuries ago. Or centuries from now.
Read Full Review >Washington Post Desson Thomson
Flanders, which takes us from the rustic heartland of northern France to the killing fields of an unnamed foreign locale, has such a primitive poetry, we are moved even by its most gruesome moments.
Read Full Review >LA Weekly Scott Foundas
The film arrives at a familiar conclusion -- that war is hell -- but the getting there is made uniquely unsettling by Dumont's relentlessly anti-psychological disposition.
Read Full Review >Los Angeles Times Kevin Crust
Nonprofessional actors Boidin and Leroux deliver intense performances which shoulder the emotional weight of the film.
Read Full Review >Empire David Parkinson
Harrowing and complex, this study in terror is not for the faint of heart.
Read Full Review >San Francisco Chronicle Mick LaSalle
Underneath the seeming blandness of its presentation -- the sparse dialogue, the affectless characters -- there's a ferocious and caustic view of humanity.
Read Full Review >The Globe and Mail (Toronto) Staff (Not credited)
With razor-sharp precision, Dumont interweaves scenes of battle with the unravelling of a young woman back home, involved with two of the soldiers. But this is not bleakness just for the sake of it. When it arrives, the ray of hope rings perfectly true for being so devoid of artifice.
Read Full Review >Chicago Sun-Times Roger Ebert
This film has few tangible pleasures, such as some somber shots of Demester walking far away in a field. Its achievement is theoretical. It wants to depict lives that are without curiosity, introspection and hope.
Read Full Review >Variety Deborah Young
A somber, beautifully acted reflection on the barbarity of war and the bestiality of man.
Read Full Review >The New York Times Stephen Holden
Whether you like or loathe Mr. Dumont’s movies, his unsettling vision of humanity stripped of cultural finery feels profoundly truthful.
Read Full Review >The Onion (A.V. Club) Scott Tobias
Once again, Dumont cycles through the pet themes of films like "L'Humanité" and "Twentynine Palms," but their repetition is beginning to seem like shtick.
Read Full Review >Film Threat Phil Hall
Bruno Dumont’s Flanders is something you don't see everyday: a decidedly non-sentimental love story.
Read Full Review >Chicago Reader Jonathan Rosenbaum
Dumont is much more confident when he sticks to the title town and the young woman the men left behind; his habit of alternating close shots with extreme long shots and his singularly unsentimental way of showing sex are as distinctive as ever.
Read Full Review >Premiere Aaron Hillis
As a fan, it's upsetting to admit that Dumont's ideas and insights have narrowed with this picture, his relaxed pacing now lethargic, his physically and mentally thick characters too familiar, and his ice-water shocks a bit predictable. It would seem self-parodic if it weren't so damn tragic.
Read Full Review >Boston Globe Wesley Morris
A powerful film of suffering and sacrifice and desperation. But it's vacuous, banal, and, where its mix of sentiment and grisliness is concerned, rather despicable.
Read Full Review >Village Voice Nathan Lee
Flanders is, dontcha know, a state of mind, and Dumont is plain out of his.
Read Full Review >The Hollywood Reporter Kirk Honeycutt
Pretentious to the core and lacking any context or credible characterizations.
Read Full Review >What Our Users Said
The average user rating for this movie is 7.6 (out of 10) based on 3 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
Faron W gave it a10:
Best film of 2006, or any year for that matter. Dare you to see it!
Robert H. gave it a5:
If you've seen a Bruno Dumont film before or even if you haven't it all gets real old real fast.
