Ararat | | Cast : | Charles Aznavour, Eric Bogosian, Brent Carver | | Director : | Atom Egoyan | | Studio : | Buena Vista Home Vid | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen, Dolby | | Released Date : | January 01, 2002 | | DVD Released Date : | May 03, 2005 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), French (Dubbed), English (Subtitled) | | Audience Rating : | R (Restricted) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | May 18, 2005 | | Summary | Regardless of the subject, this is a great movie! | Content
 | A while back a friend of mine (a *HUGE* Egoyan fan) and I (who views his movies kind of as "take it or leave it") got into a heated debate about this movie over lunch. I loved the movie; I thought that it was intricate, had great characters which were subtle and well written, and flowed from the past to the present beautifully. My friend could not forgive the "movie about making a movie" plot; he thought it was just too cheesy and it ruined the whole experience for him.
There are some heated reviews of this movie based on it's subject--did it really happen? did it really happen as Egoyan portrayed it? are people using the term "Holocaust" and "genocide" injudiciously?
For me, when I think of this movie, I think of the conversation between me and my friend. Just as a movie, regardless of Armenian "experience", this is still a great movie.
What I loved about it was the personal relationships outside of the broader scope of historical events-- a young man trying to navigate between his relationship with his mother and his girlfriend, a father coming to terms with his gay son, an actor trying to portray something larger than himself, and all the characters trying to come to terms with an event from which they are all far removed. For me this movie is about a historical event (subject to much debate) _AND_ the inter-twining lives of people who otherwise would never have met.
In response to my sullen and disappointed friend: I thought the "movie about making a movie" plot was brilliant because you never know what you are watching--the "truth" about what really happened, or the "movie" the characters are making about what happened or what they want people to *think* happened.
Now, one could make an argument that it's impossible for me to disregard the controversial "subject" of the movie and just see an inter-play between characters, and for those of you who think that . . . well, that's what I enjoyed about this movie.
PS: I thought the speacial features on the DVD were kind of lame and didn't match my emotional experience watching the movie. Just skip the features. |
| Rating | | | Date | May 18, 2005 | | Summary | "Adam" has posted the same denial review 7+ times... | Content
| ...so he has posted the same review 7+ times on ANY book (and/or DVD) about the Armenian Genocide and the Turkish attrocities between 1890 and 1922. He HAS NOT READ any of these books so his reviews are as good as dirt. Please disregard his bogus immature approach. Check out the "All my Reviews" tab and you will see that "Adam" and many others were just sent here to Amazon to flood the gates with bogus reviews of perfectly good works of art. They are pushing Turkish propaganda on a site where literary ctitiscism is needed, not pushing agendas... |
| Rating | | | Date | January 27, 2005 | | Summary | a giant multi-colored tapestry | Content
| A film within a film within a film that plays out through a myriad of interconnected stories sewn into a giant multi-colored tapestry. The so called "Armenian holocaust" is the fabric from which director Egoyan spins his narrative, and this event so heavily laden with emotional baggage, becomes almost impossible to approach with intellectual objectivity. The lines between fact and fiction are constantly blurred as in a scene where the protagonist walks onto a movie set about the "holocaust" and one of the characters scolds her, not as an actor, but as a very real character from that time. At times this constant commingling loses focus, but Egoyan's heartfelt attempt to bring back the dead through his art imitating art approach, succeeds surprisingly well. Although the "holocaust" is shown graphically, Egoyan is aware that we connect most deeply with that to which we can all relate, and this is shown right from the start as an artist attempts to transfer his childhood memories of murdered loved ones to a painter's canvas; the details of a mothers dress . . . the skin of a mothers hand . . . her fingers knitting a quilt. The vivid colors and simple reality of that hand are so compelling they can reach out across decades of despair to caress the forehead, reduce fever, and impart a sense of belonging - a reason for being. From this inauspicious beginning, Egoyan is able to arrive at a much greater truth: the inherent need for human beings to believe in something - whether or not that belief is grounded in reality or can be proven scientifically. Finally, ARATAT concludes with a simple truth that is just as powerful: the immeasurable but often neglected joy at being able to look upon our loved ones and to hold them in an embrace of life. |
| Rating | | | Date | November 11, 2004 | | Summary | Moving and emphatic. | Content
| I enjoyed the movie and subject matter becauase I am a history buff. I would have enjoyed it more if some of the characters were further developed, and a little less time was spent on the other characters, such as the young man's love interest. Moving into the subject matter of the film, even more interesting is the fact that even today, Turks and Turkish sympathizers continue to deny the atrocities commited by the Ottoman Empire against the Armenians. Such as the character played by Koteas in the movie. Even today the Turks continue to disparage and/or deny the atrocities commited by the Turkish government much to the horor of the Armenian families who were victims of the holocaust. Generally it is the position of most Turks and Turkish government proponents that either the Armenian genocide did not occur, or it is grossly exaggerated. Like the holocaust is exaggerated? Interesting argument, however, sadly for them, and more deeply hurtful to the Armenians, and other victims of genocide/holocaust such as the jews, denial of the occurence of history only firms up the convictions of the survivors or successors to dig deeper and push harder. To conclude, although clearly not Schindler's List or the Pianist in its nature and quality, I believe this movie, although a little rough around the edges, is a very interesting look at a very dark side of human history.
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| Rating | | | Date | October 22, 2004 | | Summary | A sin against the memory of the genocide victims & families | Content
| There's really no other way for me to say this. This movie really disappointed me. Obviously the intent was to bring some attention to this horrible moment in time that has been largely forgotten (or never known of) by people who were not directly affected by it. That is why I rented this movie. I've read a few books on the topic, and Armenian musics are some of the world's best, but this movie is a clunker.
There is too much garbage going on. I don't mean that it is hard to follow, because it isn't at all. It's just that 75% of what's happening is trite, as well as extraneous to anything having to do with the genocide itself. There is more than enough tear-jerking "human drama" potential within the stories of the genocide itself, so why is so much of the movie wasted on trying to unravel this insipid love-gone-bad tangent among Raffi's mom, her dead ex-husband, and Raffi's step-sister (Daughter of dead ex-husband. She's also Raffi's girlfriend)? The step-sister is a waste of space whom you can't even begin to care about. All she does is whine about her dead father, who had absolutely nothing to do with any storyline related to the genocide.
Then there is the actor playing Raffi. His scenes in customs with Christopher Plummer are painful. He has no emotional power whatsoever. He will relate some horrendous story of the genocide, and then try to "sell it" to us by doing his Tom Cruise jaw-muscle flex thing and pretending to be haunted, as he longingly looks into Plummer's eyes. It's horrible. I think only Bokeem Woodbine or Keanu Reeves could have given worse performances here.
Oh did I mention that Christopher Plummer's son is gay and he (dad) is having trouble coming to terms with it. Oh did I mention that Plummer's gay son is dating Elias Koteas who just happens to also be a Turkish colonel or something in the "movie within a movie" about the genocide, yet he (Elias' "real life movie character", rather than his "movie in a movie" character) doesn't think the genocide ever actually happened because all he read about were some deportations as well as the standard ravages of war?
If at this point you're thinking my review is annoying in its mention of all this drivel that has nothing to do with the actual genocide, well, you now have a good picture of exactly what this movie is like. It's as if the director pitched this idea to a studio and the studio said yeah we can do a movie on this topic... as long as it's in the background since we need to add in a love triangle, a step-sister's bare breasts, the strained relationship of a father and his gay son, a boring filmmaker who gives his all to make sure a customs official knows the story of the genocide as they wonder whether or not there is heroin in his film canisters, etc...
Woops did I mention a fictionalized story of Arshile Gorky? It's here, too!
Knowing the story of this atrocity, I fully expected there to be no way I'd get through this movie without breaking down in tears. For me, the Armenian Genocide is one of those events along the lines of Rwanda 1994, or Sudan of the past couple decades, etc... Horrible events that are almost worse (not that that's possible) just for the simple fact that almost no one seems to care, notice, or remember, simply because there seems to be no political or economic gain in caring.
The one great performance in this movie is given by Elias Koteas. Not so much during the "movie within a movie" scenes (as it's obvious that movie was going to be worse than Ararat), but during the "now" parts of this movie, where he is the gay Turkish actor who doesn't believe the genocide happened. Elias completely inhabits the role of the apathetic, uneducated "Hey just get over it!" persona that is so widespread both here in the USA and elsewhere in the world in relation to other atrocities. Thank you Elias! Yes your character was a quiet jerk, but you played him perfectly... easily the most powerful performance of the film. I just feel bad for you that you were stuck having to give this performance in a movie as bad as this.
This event deserves better. I hope someone else makes a movie on this topic someday. A couple of the bonus features here are nice, but still, you'd do better to get that information (and much more) from books.
Do you want to lose yourself in the power and culture of the Armenian people? Skip this movie and pick up any of the CDs by Udi Hrant, Richard Hagopian, Djivan Gasparyan, etc... that I've reviewed here.
On these discs you get pure Armenian cultural power and emotion, with no trite lovestories gone bad and pathetic acting to dilute it.
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