
Story of a sergeant in the French Foreign Legion in Djibouti whose ordered life is turned upside down with the arrival of a new recruit who finds favor with the unit's commander. Loosely based on Herman Melville's Billy Budd.
Publisher:
New York, N.Y. : New Yorker Video, 2002
Edition:
Widescreen version
ISBN:
9781567302677
156730267X
156730267X
Branch Call Number:
DVD F Bea French
Additional Contributors:


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Add a CommentAn opportunity to take a long look at a bunch of well conditioned young men, French foreign legionnaires stationed in Africa as well as locals. Some female eye candy there in modest but colorful garb as well. Music and dance comes with the package. I think I like to have a notion of what sort of peg it all hangs on. Possibly that is a nod in the direction of 'Billy Budd'. It's been a long time since I was exposed to that piece, but someone said its a loose connection and that seems right to me. A critic who praised it highly called it a quintessential critic's film. Others might find reason to disagree, but her projects seem to me exercises in casting a cold eye on the realities under study. Possibly just what the doctor ordered.
a wonderful French art film that retells Melville's "Billy Bud" story from the point of view of
French Legionnaires instead of sailors, full of powerful moments and very evocative. A study in the dynamics of power play among men when left to their own devices. The ruthlessness of youthful male beauty and the desire to control or destroy it come to play in the film.