User reviews

'The Man on the Train' is a beautiful movie about two man later in life. One of them is a bank robber, the other is a teacher. They meet by accident and become friends. Slowly they both start wishing they would have been the other man.

The teacher (Jean Rochefort) knows what the bank robber (Johnny Hallyday) does for his money. He even offers to help, but the day the bank will be robbed he has to go into surgery. We see how the teacher pretends to be a cool guy, even changes his looks to that. We also see how the bank robber pretends to be a teacher when the real teacher is out.

All this leads to an ending that closes things in one way, but leaves things open in another. We feel an ending like this coming, but it still works. It is beautiful and fits the rest of the movie perfectly.

If your favorite movies are like 'The Fast and the Furious' you will probably not like this. It is a real European movie, sometimes slow, most of the time very quiet, but if you can appreciate this kind of film making you will like 'The Man on the Train'.

1st watched 8/9/2003 - 7 out of 10(Dir-Patrice Leconte): Wonderful drama about two men who want to switch places in life because each is bored of what their life has become. One is a bank robber, and the other is a retired poetry teacher. The bank robber is plain tired of the excitement and the other wants excitement in his life. The retired poetry teacher also has an upcoming triple-bypass heart surgery that lends to his aggressiveness about trying out the other lifestyle. Like many French dramas, this movie takes it's time and explores the characters and let's us get to know them. This is `so' lacking in most American films these days and therefore this is a breath of fresh air for those who are okay with reading subtitles. While watching this movie you get the feeling that you're watching two `real' people interacting despite their differences. Do they ever switch places? Well, sort of but like other French dramas `reality' is where the film stays for the most part. The ability for the characters to understand and accept each other is `just' wonderful and makes a wonderful statement about how we should `all' interact and I think this is what makes this film remarkable.

European cinema again; again originality, again stuff almost unique that I'm afraid I'll never find something similar. Here, the story about two people, and those two alone, and it is not easy two keep up ninety minutes developing their experiences. You need to have a good eye, pace, and respect for your characters.

These characters are Milan (Johnny Hallyday), a thief; and Monsieur Manesquier (Jean Rochefort), a retired literature professor. Their differences make their encounters scary. One, an old man who likes to talk and is fascinated by this mysterious obscure man in strange clothes; Manesquier enters Milan's room and imagines to be in a fantasy world he couldn't live in.

Milan is quiet and soft talking, but induces the old man into the drinking again, into excitement and adventures; and after meeting his pals he even doubts about carrying on with the only thing he came to do to this town: rob a bank. He reaches the limit of giving a literature lesson to one of Manesquier's pupils.

The camera is in love with them both, and presents each one in an original way when they are on screen. Different colors, postures, followings. Each one might hide something; there's a past, but that's not what this story that wanders through coincidences and casualties of life wants to show.

A simple aspirin, a glass of water; what can that lead to. The anxiety of a man to be part of something he never lived, on one side. On the other side the silence and intrigue of the little conversation. The glasses of wine, the lunches that seem to say much but are saying almost nothing about the characters.

The music, by Pacscal Estève, is very important to the film; giving to it a touch of Westerns style, playing to represent the state of mind and humor of the characters when we see them, or simply, not playing at all; and that's very good sometimes. Ivan Maussion's production design is also a good point for that matter, with his deserted streets and lonely places.

The screenplay results to be cultured and very intelligent. Patrice Leconte's frequent writing collaborator leaves everything in his character's hands; because the words are his. Also frequently cast by Leconte, Jean Rochefort's delivery is impressing in his measured role, that requires little but well done. It's Johnny Hallyday, however, the one who steals, or shines in his loneliness. With all those looks and his face, always full of hidden things.

Metaphors join us again, in the movie; for us to interpret. I tried, and everyone will, but I say: thank Europe for these movies; it's worth and more a kind of pleasure to watch them!

"Man on the train", directed by Patrice Leconte is "intimiste" French cinema at its best. It tells the story of a chance encounter and ensuing friendship between Milan, a gangster who is coming to a small French town to rob a bank and Manesquier, a retired professor of poetry who has lived there his whole life. The two protagonists could not be more different and yet, each one becomes fascinated by the other's life. Soon, Milan tries on slippers and Manesquier is shooting a gun at soda cans. Was Milan's life wasted because he never had the strength to fill his life with the structure he so desires? Was Manesquier's life wasted because he never had the strength to escape the structured life he so loathes? Will they go all the way and actually exchange lives? The movie is extremely well directed and photographed, with grainy blueish colors that support each character's melancholy. The script is tight and leaves room for silent moments which are as important to the story as the dialogue (a concept unknown in Hollywood). Every word has a deeper meaning than its litteral one. In one of the best scenes of the movie, the elegant poetry professor Manesquier puts on Milan's leather jacket and stands in front of the mirror saying in English: "The name is Earp...Wyatt Earp". But in the end, what makes the movie such a gem is the talent of the two lead actors who, like their characters, are such extreme opposites that their screen relationship could easily have ended up devoid of any chemestry. Jean Rochefort is an intellectual and one of France's greatest and most subtle living actors. Johnny Hallyday is the uneducated, over-the-top rock'n roll singer and social icon who has monopolized the #1 spot in French music charts since 1960 and who has been derided by the French intelligentsia ever since. Until the movie, Rochefort himself was no fan of Hallyday, though he likes to say with a grin: "Madame Rochefort, on the other hand...". They have since become friends. It, reportedly, took a lot of effort by Rochefort and Leconte to make Hallyday comfortable enough to act opposite Rochefort whom he saw as a towering icon. They most certainly succeeded since, in the end, it is the surprising subtelty of Hallyday's performance that makes the movie so poignant. Despite the botox injections and the face lifts, his Mount Rushmore face looks like that of a man who has been to hell and back a few hundred times. He has such presence and charisma that you can't take your eyes off him whenever he appears on the screen. Though he plays Milan with a minimalist approach, both in demeanor and delivery, he manages to display the most intense emotions in a simple grin, a gesture or a stare. The way he smokes Manesquier's pipe while explaining Balzac's "Eugenie Grandet" (which he has obviously never read) to a private student of Manesquier will make you chuckle. The way he looks at Manesquier when he leaves his house at the end of the movie will simply break your heart... "Man on the train" is a gentle, tender film which asks big questions in little ways. Let's pray it never gets remade in Hollywood...

We know this film from childhood, but the child has grown. Here we are in a provincial French city when the cowboy rides in on the iron train to transform the life of a citizen, unexpectedly, profoundly.

Jean Rochefort, with his great face of character, about to go for major surgery, a three vessel bypass, a wifeless man of regrets, a retired teacher of literature to secondary students, is about to meet his fantasy: Johnny Hollyday (the Elvis of France?) who plays a bank robber about to perform his retirement job. Meeting by apparent chance, though clearly pre-ordained, the fantasies of the lonely, anxious teacher whose love of poetry might be his most tender trait in an otherwise ruthlessly real view of the world, are set in motion. Hollyday becomes his unexpected guest...the lone hotel is closed for the season...and an excitement comes to Rochefort's life. The man has guns. There is a picture of him looking terribly western in his leather jacket, the enigmatic stranger/cowboy in the mythos of his host. Ah, to be that man, to fire that gun, to live that life of dark adventure.

It goes on to its meaningful end, not told here except to say that the last scene may be an error, a prolongation that was unnecessary and added nothing to the power of the film, nor detracted from the marvelous performance of Rochefort, who can do no wrong with any role, or Hollyday, whose acting turn here is perfect in the Robert Mitchum noir sense, but tinged with an old-world tiredness that is quite moving. All this with fine subsidiary acting, a perfectly murky Simenonoish setting, and Schubert's melancholic sounds. Ah, bon. Tres, tres bon.

The movie has a simple and short story. John an experienced bank rubber (acted by Johnny Hallyday) enters a small town to rub a bank. By accident, he meets an old school teacher, played by Jean Rochefort, that happens to be so kind that allow him to stay at his old antique place. Apparently these two guys have totally different backgrounds but they share a common thing. They are not happy. The old teacher is thirsty for adventure while the the experienced rubber is sick of it. This contrast is the essence of the story and in fact thats all what the movie is about. The main focus of the film is on the interaction between the main characters and the way they affect each other. Even though they don't really change their course of life but at the end, in a surreal scene, it seems that they really have wanted to change their places.

There are a few things that I like to mention about the movie. First it has a slow pace, building gradually without any intensity or complication. Definitely this is not always a good choice but the style perfectly fits the story. However to my opinion there are some parts that doesn't add any meaning to the whole. For example the scene where the other thieves are trying to steal a car to use it in the rubbery is really extra (maybe it was there just to advertise BMW cars) Another example is the mysterious driver that doesn't speak at all except for a short sentence at 10:00 am each day. I don't understand what is the point of putting this in the story? The choice of the actors is great. Specially Johnny Hallyday with his Wolfy-eyes doesn't need to put much effort into the act, we just believe it! At the other hand Jean Rochefort's act as expected is perfect. The music is beautiful. In some places, the sound of piano interleaves with the gangster-like theme that is quite clever. It also helps the director to better depict the atmosphere of the story.

In overall I enjoyed the movie. Good job!

I immensely enjoyed this film, albeit for somewhat shameful reasons! It is rather clichéd, has many inconsistencies and unlikely plot devices, however it is also knowing, charming and unapologetically French. Whilst it will not become one of my favoured films as the characters are a little weak and as i've said the story is rather sentimental I got a great deal of pleasure watching it.

This is just the sort of drama American studios seem unable to make and this is why this slender little film punches so far above it's weight. Undoubtedly 'non actor' Hallyday would run rings around a great many of Hollywood's sons. The beginning and end of the film were the highlights, although I feel better use could have been made of the train and it's journey as a vehicle for the themes explored.

My favourite film, maybe of all time. Brilliant acting , a great atmospheric background, compelling characters and a plot than is enthralling and also thought provoking. The interactions between the two leads are superbly written and delivered. Watch and enjoy. 10/10.

Excellent, well paced, beautifully shot, intelligently scripted film that could have only come out of France. Without becoming sentimental, except perhaps for part of the ending, this is an engrossing tale that begins with two completely different men meeting as they leave a pharmacy. Jean Rochefort as the hermit like villager in his ramshackle mansion, is of course immaculate and convincing from the start but Johnny Hallyday as the man who has arrived by train for a few days is a revelation. The film tells of the relationship of the two men as it develops over those couple of days, in fact and in their imagination. The fact that Hallyday is in this village to meet up with fellow baddies and hold up the local bank is at once central and yet almost irrelevant as the main two characters psyche become entwined. Great film making and whilst I find the start of the end fine, as others have mentioned it does go a little too far and considering the beauty and measured pace of the rest of the film, I do consider, at least the very end to be a mistake. It does not, however, spoil the delight that this film is.

"Man on the Train (L'Homme du train)" is a small story of cumulative details done exceedingly well that could simply not be done by Hollywood.

The excellent leads, each charismatic in his own way, talky Jean Rochefort and taciturn Johnny Hallyday (who brings none of his pop star baggage to an American audience), are past middle age. There is a lot of Rohmer-like sitting around talking over a bottle of wine.

The emphasis is on very gradual, internal realizations by each character that are revealed by a subtle accretion of surprising little decisions, such as wearing slippers or getting a new haircut, culminating in an unpredictable, yet beautifully satisfying conclusion.

Photographed in a shades of gray palette that is almost in black-and-white, a small town and its interconnections and personalities are beautifully evoked.

The women in their lives are ancillary, which is just as well, as they are not completely believable.

The poetry teacher is too sophisticated to quote John Greenleaf Whittier, but I will, on the theme: "Of all the words of tongue or pen/the saddest are these/It might have been."

Milan (Johnny Hallyday) is a criminal who arrives in a quiet small town by train. Monsieur Manesquier (Jean Rochefort) is one of the few people around and he invites Milan to stay in his home. He's a retired teacher and the two men talk. They find each other's lives appealing.

The problem for me is that there is some kind of appeal from these two people acting together. They are some well-known french personalities. Of course, I have no idea who these people are and I don't find their interactions that special. It has some interesting moments but it's way too slow most of the time. I kept waiting for things to happen. It's a french thriller with a different sensibility. The dialog is the most important part of the movie and it probably deserves to be listened to in French. I'm not able to appreciate this movie.

Destiny decided that Jean Rochefort and Johnny Hallyday, the two wonderful lead actors of "L'homme du train" ("Man on the Train") died a couple of months apart, at the end of 2017. Destiny or coincidence? This question is actually one of the key topics of this wonderful film directed by Patrice Leconte and made in 2002, 15 years before the disappearance of these two sacred monsters of French cinema (and music in the case of Johnny Hallyday).

This is the story of two men who meet by chance. Monsieur Manesquier (Jean Rochefort) is a retired teacher of French literature who lives an old bachelor life in the bourgeois house where he was born and where he is supposed to die. Milan (Johnny Hallyday) is a bank robber who came to the small town to prepare the robbery of the local bank. One talks a lot, the other is a man of few words. We'll get to know much about the previous life of the first, and almost nothing about the second who is a mysterious gangster figure on the line of characters like the one in Jean-Pierre Melville's "Le Samouraï". They apparently have not too much in common, but they will discover soon not only consistent affinities, but also something more surprising: each of them yearn to the way of life of the other.

"L'homme du train" is flawlessly executed, starting with the well written script which builds the two characters from a well dosed mix of dialogs and silences, the set that recreates the small town house full of memories from other times, and the superb acting of the two actors. Patrice Leconte also plays with cinematographic quotes like the Western-like beginning which brings the stranger to the remote small town to the gardener with the scythe scene reminding Ingmar Bergman. There is a lot of charm in the relationship between the two men who get gradually to know each other, in the atmosphere that surrounds them with signs of the unexpected convergence of their fates. "L'homme du train" is a beautiful movie in the best tradition of the French minimalism combined with 'film noir'. A gem that brings back to our attention that two great actors that the French cinema recently lost in one of the best films in their respective careers.

The story of two men one quiet and shy missing all the defining thrilling moments of life, the other living the adventurous life of a con always running and never planning.

They get a glimpse of each other's life and long for it.

This is a quiet movie about 2 middle aged men rethinking who they are and what they could be.

I give it a 7 as I relate to some of it and I think it is well acted. I think it is targeted more to 30-40 year old crowd.

The lack of sex and explosions will bore the average viewer expecting a Hollywood flick. This is more about substance than form.

This was a joy to watch. Sometimes a director and his/her actors are utterly in sync. Here we have the unfolding of two somewhat mysterious characters. One leads a life of violence; the other is living an unfulfilled tedious existence. The man on the train arrives and the kind professor offers him a place to stay. At first they seem to be so far apart in their life stories, one would think they would never connect. As time passes, we find out that neither is happy with his lot. The violent man begins to see the almost monotonous life of the professor as very desirable, while the aged teacher feels that he has never had any adventure. A bank holdup is in the offing and he even asks to be a part of it. The best part of the film is the learning process that takes place as a sort of love develops between them. The old professor is very ill and is going to have surgery, and his relationship with his new friend sustains him, though he is filled with fear. See this for the subdued yet powerful portrayals of the two stellar actors.

I liked the improbable but interesting story about a dull older man living vicariously through a tough stranger who has come to town to rob a bank. He wanted "one last thrill" and the crook wanted, at least in a small way, some connection to normalcy. This was the basis for an intriguing film. In fact, I liked it until the last 15 minutes or so--when the movie switched to SLOW MOTION-mode and got all artsy and "symbolic". Well, I for one, did not need all this, as it was very possible to understand the symbolism and juxtaposition of characters WITHOUT the painfully slow camera-work. Simply running the film in regular speed and not making the symbolism so obvious would have worked better, I think. Because of the poor handling of the ending, the movie rates a 6 instead of an 8.

This movie makes us think and wonder. Enthralling. Very interesting characters. A quiet story but stirring deep in our hearts. It made me feel and think about the emotions and thoughts happening to the characters. Like a good book, it's good that it's slow. There's room for subjective interpretations on the many layers of story. The viewer can identify itself to either of the main characters, which is rare in modern films. The cinematography and sound track are so perfectly matched to the film that it never distracts us.

Worth seeing and recommending.

Diane

"The Man on the Train" is a masterfully crafted, character driven, subtitled French flick about two aging men who come together by happenstance. What makes the film interesting is not the story but the way the two men with very opposite lifestyles covet the other's as it appears to be the stuff of his own dreams. The film, however, fizzles on story in the very end as it inches ever closer to its date with destiny and then wanders into a metaphysical sort of hocus-pocus conclusion. The pleasure in this film, which received high marks from public and critics alike, is in the journey as the destination is unsatisfying and anticlimactic. Recommended only for foreign film freaks. (B)

Homme Du Train (Man from the train) is about two man, one a gangster showing up in a small provincial French town to pull a robbery in its small branch single bank. Surely he arrives a few days prior for planning purposes. Being such a small town, no open hotel (out of season) he find himself guest in a home of a local old retired professor of poetry. The Teacher is lonely and bored, looking for pal to talk and drink with.Two very different types at the beginning are gradually getting closer to discover the qualities and the similarities between them. The story gradually develops to a point where they cross each other path the Gangster becoming a teacher of poetry and literature and the Teacher wishing to become a gangster. It is about faith.. we develop in life to become what we become greatly by faith and not by choice..circumstances change and we change accordingly. Very thoughtfully movie keeping , excellent job by both the actors and the maker of the movie

Patrice Leconte's Man on the Train is a slow-paced study of two unlikely friends who envy the other's way of life. Manesquier, strikingly portrayed by French film star Jean Rochefort, is a loquacious ex-poetry teacher and Milan, (French rock n' roll star Johnny Hallyday) is a thief who regrets not having lived a more respectable life. Based on the screenplay by Claude Klotz, the film has its amusing and thoughtful moments, however I found the relationship implausible and the dialogue "literary" and forced.

Milan arrives by train in a small French town at the beginning of winter to meet up with his associates and rob the local bank. He meets Manesquier at a drug store and the two strike up a conversation. When Milan discovers that the only hotel in town is closed, Manesquier invites him to spend a few days with him in his Victorian house that has become rundown since his mother died fifteen years. Not much happens in the way of action but their exchanges reveal that each has become dissatisfied and wants to switch identities with the other. Manesquier puts on Milan's leather jacket and poses before the mirror, thinking of himself as gunslinger Wyatt Earp. Milan, on the other hand, longs for a life of stability and ease, feeling comfortable in a pair of the teacher's slippers.

The day of the planned bank robbery coincides with Manesquier's scheduled triple bypass heart surgery and as the days lead up to this event, both men act more and more like the other. Manesquier practices with Milan's guns at a shooting range and goes looking for a fight at a local bar while Milan takes on the task of teaching one of his friend's young pupils. While the ending has a metaphysical quality that I really enjoyed, on the whole I found Man on The Train to be devoid of energy and the conversations lacking in the warmth and spontaneity of real life.

Very slow, with a disappointing conclusion. Characters were interesting, as was basic thesis -- two lonely men in later life taking a hard look at choices. Both characters were engaging and sympathetic, but the film PLODDED through many inexplicable and unnecessary scenes to a very flawed ending. I would not recommend this film to anyone.