Vinyan

Just got my dvd today. Have it sitting on my desk here at work so I can look at Rufus. My coach noticed it and said it looked interesting. I probably won't get a chance to see it until tomorrow after work.

Ambra--I thought that was the most meaningfull phrase of the film too, : "You let him go". Like you mentioned it referred to his physically and mentally letting thier son go. I remember hearing/reading somewhere that in films they will refer/portray the main theme three times for continuity and impact, as was the case here. I remember thinking "is she more mad because he physically or mentally let him go??" One can't help letting go of someone when a wave comes crashing down on you, dangnabit!! They would have probably both drowned (it's very hard to save a drowning person and yourself unless you're trained to do so, many people die trying, sadly) Anyway, I realized it didn't really matter...she didn't forgive him for either obviously, and sacrificed their relationship to the alter of her despair, dragging Paul down into the madness, and then his death. Paul had faced the reality their son was gone. But when pressed with the possibility, however slight, that his son might actually be found alive, Paul felt they had to take the chance. Even if he thought it was a wild ghost chase, he didn't want to the parent who gives up, I think. Especially when deep down he felt guilty about not saving him.
I wish I could say I liked this film, but it was too depressing for me to say that. (I appreciate it's quality though.) From the get-go it was a downward spiral that you knew wouldn't end well. Not that every movie needs a happy ending, but I thought something ironic at the end would have been more interesting (like that both parents had died looking for him, and he was shortly thereafter actually found or something?) The fact that the only big surprise for me was that Paul was gored rather than stoned to death, well that was sort of a let down. I'm probably just being picky, because after all, so much human emotion was portrayed so very well in the film and I should just shut up and be happy with that.
For instance. It takes a very skilled director to present a sex scene with Rufus, where the only thing this viewer felt is sadness.
The sadness of seeing a lonely, desperate, drunk man make love to his zombie of a wife. He had tried to connect with her before, but she killed the mood by bringing up thier dead son being in the room!

Their relationship had nowhere to go because she had almost become a shell of a person even before they set off into the jungle. And when you are so angry with your husband and cannot forgive him...well there's no love left.
I still think a more intrigueing and thought provoking ending could have been written. How 'bout a turn-around where Paul thinks a lead they find may pan out if they get a guide to take them further into the jungle, he phones his pal who refuses to fund it, so the couple strike out on thier own to find the son but die trying. As their posh-charity sponsering friends discuss the folly and waste of thier deaths at the home gathering following their funeral a news report comes on that the son had emerged from the jungle alive. It comes out that during the tsunami he had a head injury and couldn't remember his own name. But he did remember his parents always told him to stay in one place if he was lost and they would come find him, which was what he did. He only came out when he heard rumors of a white couple looking for their lost son who was wearing a red shirt when he was lost. He still had the remains of a red shirt he was wearing when a tribe found him post tsunami, and so thought there was a chance it was his parents that were searching for him.
What would be interesting about an ending like that, is it turns all our assumptions of Paul and Jeane's choices and mind-state on it's head. They weren't wrong after all. He was still alive.

"I just watched it at my parents house over easter dinner....big effing mistake let me tell you. The movie itself was good...a tad odd and very......french (no offence to anybody here) but still good. And yes the emotions were raw and in your face, but the entire time I was condemning the wife. I understand how it could be hard to lose a son...especially if you never got any closure, but I'm sorry, I saw her as a crazy pshycho bi** from hell. She goes nuts thinking she saw her son alive and drags her husband along for a wild and terrifying ride into nothingness and laughs after he's killed. Now maybe her laughter was her way of releasing, or maybe it was just some odd choice of directing meant to symbolize something, but it pissed me off. Poor taste IMO. Her husband was just disembowled by a bunch of demon children and then she moans and laughs when they rub her down? Disgusting.

I'm gonna have a hard time getting this one out of my head and that is pretty unusual for me, I can normally stomach the really gory movies, but at least I understand those movies...this one>? not so much."

This is something I do NOT want to watch.

hold on, hold on...
danny & i will be watching it today or tonight, and we will have our word to add to the debate. given that usually i can't stand emmanuelle béart, DGD's comment makes me wary, but i will try and watch without prejudice.
will be on the look out for

well, if emmanuelle is undressed in the same scenes, that might help.