Quand le roi Louis XVI lance les États-Généraux,cela déclenche les débuts d'une Révolution en 1789,qui allait coûter sa vie et de plusieurs nobles, et sans compter les conflits internes. Une... Tout lireQuand le roi Louis XVI lance les États-Généraux,cela déclenche les débuts d'une Révolution en 1789,qui allait coûter sa vie et de plusieurs nobles, et sans compter les conflits internes. Une étape marquante dans l'Histoire du Monde.Quand le roi Louis XVI lance les États-Généraux,cela déclenche les débuts d'une Révolution en 1789,qui allait coûter sa vie et de plusieurs nobles, et sans compter les conflits internes. Une étape marquante dans l'Histoire du Monde.
- Prix
- 2 nominations au total
Histoire
Le saviez-vous
- AnecdotesFormer French President Nicolas Sarkozy appeared a few seconds as a "Tiers Etat" member in "Les années Lumière".
- GaffesNecker is depicted as being a Swiss by Louis XVI. In fact, Necker was from Geneva and this city was still independent until 1815, when it became a part of the Swiss Confederation.
- Citations
Camille Desmoulins: [Danton has just called Robespierre a eunuch] Well, how did it go?
Georges-Jacques Danton: I could have been more diplomatic.
- ConnexionsFeatured in The Secret Masonic Victory of World War Two (2022)
As for the actors: Brandauer does a superb job (as he almost always does), though is perhaps the least believable of the "protagonists", considering Dantons larger-than-life image. This Danton is a schemer, a manipulator but less of a "force of nature" (as Gerald Depardieu would portray him) and more of an opportunistic snake. Francois Cluzet does a fine job as Desmoulins, comes across as almost too blue-eyed, but the scenes are invariably stolen by Andrzej Seweryn as humanist-cum-fascist Robespierre, who plays the character as humanely perceptive as I've ever seen in a film about the topic.
Further credit must go to Balmer and Seymour as the doomed royal couple. Especially Balmer as King Louis XVI shows us a very accurate portrayal of a weak, undecided monarch; a yea-sayer, who merely drifts with the tide of time that will eventually sweep him under the guillotine. Sir Christopher Lee, who has a very small part as executioner Henri Sanson (a very interesting and multi-faceted character in his own right), responsible for the beheading of almost all major protagonists. Lee plays the character as a stern, dutiful man who, shown only through nuances and facial expression, has yet retained his humanity, basic compassion, even a disdain for the latter wave of "The Terror" that kept him busy for month at end. Indeed, one would almost have hoped for a "spin-off" which focuses entirely on the "Monsieur de Paris". Another testament to one of the most brilliant actors of our times.
The settings, from the grandeur of Versailles to the filth of the Parisian streets are completely convincing, even more so than recent films like, for example, "The Perfume".
One of the strongest aspects of the film: despite being filmed for an anniversary of the revolution, it doesn't glorify or portray the events and those involved in a heroic light. Quiet the opposite: the protagonists are all shown to be either naïve (Desmoulins), opportunistic (Danton) or generally, yet very humanly flawed and/or fanatic (Robespierre, Hebert, Saint-Just, et al). The French mob is shown as what it was: simply a mob and it comes as no big surprise that in many places the French word for "people" ("La Peuple") has since become an insult, directed at the unwashed majority, easily lolled by demagogues, carrying only to fill their bellies (be it with bread or, so it would seem, more often with liquor), driven mainly by the disdain for those whom they (often quiet rightly) conceive as something better than themselves.
If anything, the film is a reflection of more contemporary, even current politics, be it democracy, where the "Peuble" is generally bought by the highest bidding politician, communism with it's stubborn ideology or fascism, where the loudest demagogue captures the hearts and minds of people (if not to say: poisons them).
If I'd have to recommend any film or TV-Series on the French Revolution, this would be the one. Coming in at almost six hours, the four parts never seem long or boring. Quiet the opposite. At the end of the run, one is almost saddened that one has to leave those fascinating times and people (well, granted of course, that 90 percent of them have lost their heads by the time the credits play anyway).
A deserved 8 from 10.
- t_atzmueller
- 15 nov. 2014
- Lien permanent
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Détails
- Date de sortie
- Pays d’origine
- Langues
- Aussi connu sous le nom de
- La Révolution française: Les années lumière
- Lieux de tournage
- sociétés de production
- Consultez plus de crédits d'entreprise sur IMDbPro
Box-office
- Budget
- 50 000 000 $ US (estimation)
- Durée5 heures 35 minutes
- Couleur
- Mixage
- Rapport de forme
- 1.66 : 1