Product Details

• Actors: Isabelle Huppert, Martin Donovan, Elina Löwensohn, Damian Young, Chuck Montgomery
• Directors: Hal Hartley
• Format: Color
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Number of discs: 1
• Run Time: 101 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000YSI20S
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #664,651 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Isabelle is an ex-nun waiting for her special mission from God. In the meantime, she is making a living writing pornography. She meets Thomas, a sweet, confused amnesiac who cannot remember that he used to be a vicious pornographer, responsible for turning his young wife, Sofia, into the world's most notorious porn queen. Sofia's on the run, convinced she's killed him. Together, Isabelle and Thomas set out to discover his past, a past waiting to catch up with him

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An amateur rewiew, March 22, 2002

By 

Gordon Smith (san jose, ca United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Amateur [VHS] (VHS Tape)

I was channel-surfing when I landed on IFC showing a "comedy-drama" called Amateur. It was nearly an hour in, and there was this scene of these two geeky accountant types arguing about the merits of various cell-phones while using the wires from a floorlamp to electrocute a Christopher Lloyd look-alike. High-concept, but decidedly "B", I thought. But as the movie progressed, I began to notice the deliberation that led to the quirky stagger of the film. The style itself was saying things that the action couldn't begin to convey. This was high art! And it was funny in an intentionally-unintentional way.
The plot, about an ex-nun who now writes bad pornography, a porn queen with a grudge, and an ex-pornongrapher with amnesia, each searching for their identity, is interesting, but it doesn't begin to tell of the impressive stylishness of this movie. Amateur sucks you in like Beckett mixed with "letters to Penthouse", and leaves you satisfied on both accounts. If this sounds good to you, you should check it out. It shows on IFC quite frequently. Oh also, this movie turned me into a freak for Elina Lowensohn.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gets better with repeated viewings, December 22, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: Amateur [VHS] (VHS Tape)

Like all Hal Hartley films (I've seen Flirt and Henry Fool, but neither are as good as Amateur), this is a decidedly odd and mannered movie. The first time I saw it, the far-fetched plot and stilted characterizations are a bit unnerving. This is an ambitious project--Hartley explores the fall of man (an event which literally precedes the film) and original sin in the context of an off-kilter Manhattan thriller. There are some hilariously delivered deadpan one-liners (Martin Donovan: "You're a nyphmomanic and you've never had sex? How could that be?" Isabelle Huppert: "I'm choosy.") But the heart of the movie revolves around the title, and how, try as we might, we cannot escape who we are--Hartley seems to suggest that humanity's flaws are indelible, and despite the guises we might adopt, we are only novices. Amateur ranks low on entertainment value (see Air Force One instead), but a great thinking person's film: brainy, sly, somber, and at times (especially the ending), heartbreaking. Hartley's beguiling screenplay unravels its original insights upon repeated viewings, and it makes the effort worthwhile.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Pure Hartley, May 9, 2001

By 

Reviewer - See all my reviews

This review is from: Amateur [VHS] (VHS Tape)

A chance encounter in a coffee shop between two people, both of whom are seeking their own identities (one literally, one figuratively), leads to a relationship seemingly beneficial to both, but for different reasons, in "Amateur," written and directed by Hal Hartley. A man (Martin Donovan) wakes up one morning lying on his back in a quiet, out-of-the-way street in New York City; all he knows is that he's bleeding from the back of his head and is suffering from total amnesia. He has no identification on him; he has no idea who he is or how he came to be on that street. Dazed, he stumbles into a small coffee shop and sits down at the counter. He tries to order something, but the only money he has is Dutch, and he has no idea why. A young woman, also sitting at the counter and working on a lap-top computer, observes his plight and notices the blood on the back of his neck.

Her name is Isabelle (Isabelle Huppert); asking for some water, she cleans his injury and buys him something to eat. Isabelle, it turns out, is a former nun, having only recently left the convent after fifteen years. Rather lost herself, she is attempting to make a living by writing pornographic stories for a magazine. A self-professed nymphomaniac (though she is still a virgin), she also feels that she has a specific purpose in life, a destiny she has yet to fulfill, though she has yet to figure out what it is. But she believes that meeting this man is a sign; perhaps he's a part of whatever it is she has to do. So she decides to help him, which just may lead her to the answers she is seeking about her own life, as well.

As with all of Hartley's films, this one has a somewhat mesmerizing effect, which he exacts with a unique style of presenting his story that has to do with the look and feel of the film, the deliberate pace he establishes, and most especially the manner in which his actors deliver their lines. His performers speak with a rather stoic, matter-of-fact, understated rhythm that is engrossing in itself, very similar to the kind of cadence David Mamet employs in his films. But Hartley's method is even more pronounced, so that when one of his characters does have an emotional outburst, the underplaying that surrounds it significantly underscores the impact of it all.

Few directors have such a unique style that so vividly identifies their work; Mamet is one, Ingmar Bergman another (the three of them being part of a very select group). And though this particular film is not, perhaps, one of Hartley's best, it is still pure Hartley, with aspects that are certainly engaging and memorable, beginning with his main character, Isabelle. Talk about an off-the-wall character! And yet, within the context of the story, she comes across as quite real and believable, which says something about Huppert's ability as an actress, as well as Hartley's expertise as a director.

Huppert gives a very credible performance here, convincingly conveying that sense of confusion Isabelle obviously harbors deep within about her own life and where she's headed. She makes you realize that beyond anything else that's happening, this is essentially a person searching for a place to fit in, which is why she makes such a connection with this stranger, this man who really has no idea of who he is or where he belongs. And Huppert certainly makes Isabelle someone with whom it is easy to empathize.

Donovan, a veteran of many of Hartley's films, is very effective here also, with a very pensive, understated performance that clearly indicates an honest sense of this man's bewilderment, as does the very real caution with which he approaches his situation as he attempts to reorient himself and get on with his life. And Hartley develops the relationship between Isabelle and this man in real time-- there's no instant love affair here, as happens so often in cinematic renderings of similar situations-- which gives a ring of authenticity to the story, bizarre as it may get.

The supporting cast includes Elina Lowensohn (Sofia), Damian Young (Edward), Chuck Montgomery (Jan), Dave Simonds (Kurt) and Pamela Stewart (Officer Melville). No one can capture a sense of disenfranchisement any better than Hartley, as the characters in "Amateur" so aptly illustrate; these are people perpetually on the outside looking in, and yet there's something about them with which you will be able to relate, as well as sympathize . And that's part of Hartley's magic; making you realize, that in the end we're not so different from one another, after all.