A Christmas Tale
| A Christmas Tale | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by | Arnaud Desplechin |
| Produced by | Pascal Caucheteux |
| Written by | Arnaud Desplechin Emmanuel Bourdieu |
| Starring |
Catherine Deneuve Jean-Paul Roussillon Mathieu Amalric Anne Consigny Melvil Poupaud Emmanuelle Devos Chiara Mastroianni |
| Music by | Grégoire Hetzel |
| Cinematography | Eric Gautier |
| Edited by | Laurence Briaud |
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Production
company |
Why Not Productions
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| Distributed by | Bac Films |
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Release date
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Running time
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150 minutes |
| Country | France |
| Language | French |
| Box office | $7,356,393 |
A Christmas Tale (French: Un conte de Noël) is a 2008 French comedy-drama film by Arnaud Desplechin, starring Catherine Deneuve, Jean-Paul Roussillon, Mathieu Amalric, Anne Consigny, Melvil Poupaud, Emmanuelle Devos and Chiara Mastroianni. It tells the story of a family with strained relationships which gathers at the parents' home for Christmas, only to learn that their mother has leukemia. It was in competition for the Palme d'Or at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.
Junon Vuillard is Abel Vuillard's wife, and the iron-willed matriarch of the Vuillard family. Junon held her family together through many tough times, and although her willpower helped the family survive and prosper, it also has left many bad feelings among her children. Junon is still a handsome woman, and though her husband (who owns a small fabric dying plant) has become obese and clearly aged, he retains a remarkable clarity, acceptance, tolerance, and unconditional love for his family, and it is clear that he and their love for each other is the lynchpin that holds an otherwise fragmented family together, albeit uneasily.
The couple has three children, all grown and in their 30s. Their eldest daughter is Elizabeth, who is a successful playwright who is married to an equally successful man, Claude. They have one child, 16-year-old Paul, who is mentally ill and taking powerful medication to control his psychiatric problems. The couple's middle son is Henri, who drinks too much and has always fought and argued with other members of the family. He has a new girlfriend, Faunia. Ivan is the couple's youngest son. He is married to Sylvia, and they have two sons, Basile and Baptiste. Henri and Ivan are close friends with Simon, their cousin who was raised with them after the death of his parents. Simon works in Abel's small fabric dying plant, but is an avid and skilled painter in his spare time. He is also an alcoholic who has gotten in trouble many times for brawling in public. All three men dated or were interested in Sylvia at one time, but they manipulated her to think that only Ivan loved her; she married him and grew to love him. The Vuillard family's other son, Joseph, never appears alive in this film but is its core throughout, and the presence around which everyone's psyches revolve: he died of leukemia when he was six years old, despite a desperate effort to save his life by procreating another child who could be a bone marrow donor for him. It may be that part of the siblings' poor relationship is the resentment they feel toward one another for not saving Joseph's life.
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Wikipedia