X
- 2010
- Not Rated
- Kino Lorber
- 1 h 36 m
- 2010
- Not Rated
- Kino Lorber
- 1 h 36 m
Summary Hubert Minel (Xavier Dolan) is a 16-year-old Québécois living in suburban Montreal with his single mother, Chantale (Anne Dorval). Beautifully capturing the anxieties of a mother-son relationship, as well as their inability to re-affirm their love for each other, Dolan made a movie that tackles a variety of issues including bullying, the...
Directed By: Xavier Dolan
Written By: Xavier Dolan
- 2010
- Not Rated
- Kino Lorber
- 1 h 36 m
- 2010
- Not Rated
- Kino Lorber
- 1 h 36 m
I Killed My Mother
77
7.7
Summary Hubert Minel (Xavier Dolan) is a 16-year-old Québécois living in suburban Montreal with his single mother, Chantale (Anne Dorval). Beautifully capturing the anxieties of a mother-son relationship, as well as their inability to re-affirm their love for each other, Dolan made a movie that tackles a variety of issues including bullying, the...
Directed By: Xavier Dolan
Written By: Xavier Dolan
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
77
100% Positive
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Metascore
Generally Favorable
Based on 9 Critic Reviews
77
100% Positive
9 Reviews
9 Reviews
0% Mixed
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
0% Negative
0 Reviews
0 Reviews
Xavier Dolan's I Killed My Mother marks the emergence of an exciting new filmmaking talent. The Montreal actor, a mere 20 years old, displays a startlingly mature perspective on human behavior in his triple threat position as writer-director-star.
As a director, Mr. Dolan has a freewheeling style, and he’s self-dramatizing enough to want to call attention to it without being too much of a visual show-off.
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 73 User Ratings
7.7
78% Positive
57 Ratings
57 Ratings
14% Mixed
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
8% Negative
6 Ratings
6 Ratings
User Score
Generally Favorable
Based on 73 User Ratings
7.7
78% Positive
57 Ratings
57 Ratings
14% Mixed
10 Ratings
10 Ratings
8% Negative
6 Ratings
6 Ratings
The movie is full of drama, as it had to be. I mean, they're talking about a **** boy with his mom and they do not have any communication. But you can see how that lack of communication affects both. At the final part he understands her, and she does the same for him. 5 stars: The movie was spectacular, because you can see similar problems in the society today. The part the you'll like, it that the movie could be cliché, but it wasn't.
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Anne Dorval gives an extraordinary performance as the mother, who lashes out at the boy but can't disguise her own suffering when he lands an emotional punch; their scenes together reminded me of Paul Schrader's Affliction for their sense of familial love gone hopelessly sour.
Love sometimes hurts, but love/hate is always pure anguish. That's the two-stroke engine powering I Killed My Mother ( J'ai tué ma mère), a coming-of-age tale as ferociously raw as its teller - the very young Xavier Dolan.
There’s much to praise, especially the oh-so-real dialogue, but true psychological penetration is lacking and Dolan’s hunger to prove his talent results in a superfluity of styles. Still, multigenerational auds worldwide will likely find kinship with the many funny/painful situations, and pic is a genuine crowdpleaser.
I Killed My Mother fares less well when Dolan gives in to some ill-conceived stylistic flourishes (understandable for a young, first-time filmmaker) or when his reach as a dramatist exceeds his grasp (an incident involving thugs who gay-bash Hubert, for example, feels superfluous). But the crux of the film is the furious, tempestuous bond between Hubert and Chantale, and through their volcanic fights, you can see Dolan's considerable talent at its least adorned. [23 Apr 2010, p.G7]
I Killed My Mother is a film best heard than seen, as the earnest, nimble scrubbiness of Dolan's screenplay is ill-served by his conceited visuals, an aesthetic mode that feels insecurely borrowed from perfume commercials and the work of Jean-Luc Godard and Wong Kar-Wai.
This is a beautiful movie, a little unrelatable at times, I feel as though it lacks pathos, but for me that didn't did not seem to be an issue worth stopping the film for. The storyline is a little back and forth, yet the drama in this is very intense and the beauty in which this film was what amazed me. It has many similarities to "Mysterious skin" in my opinion and is a quite stark in the image it's portraying. I would not suggest watching this film with a lesson or a thought that is applicable for your life tomorrow or the next day, or with a view that you could just sit back and watch this film comfortably. It truly is an experience to watch.
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One look at that summary and you already know that there's going to be some extreme navel-gazing here. The question, then, is just how much do we get out of watching Dolan work through his Oedipal traumas? The answer, in my case, is: not enough. There's nothing really wrong with this film, and Dolan himself is very pleasant to look at, but the story never transcends its micro scale. Don't expect to learn anything about mothers and sons that you did not already know.
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Production Company
Mifilifilms
Release Date Jul 30, 2010
Duration 1 h 36 m
Rating Not Rated
Awards
Vancouver Film Critics Circle
• 4 Wins & 5 Nominations
Jutra Awards
• 3 Wins & 5 Nominations
Cannes Film Festival
• 3 Wins & 4 Nominations
