Product Details

• Actors: Kyle McCulloch, Paul Cox, Gosia Dobrowolska, Sarah Neville
• Directors: Guy Maddin
• Format: Color, DVD, NTSC, Original recording remastered
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Zeitgeist Films
• DVD Release Date: March 24, 2009
• Run Time: 100 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B001MV4A20
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #126,256 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

CAREFUL - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Keep an Eye on Guy, April 13, 2004

By 

Wayne A. (Belfast, Northern Ireland) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Careful (DVD)

I'll never forget the first time I saw a Guy Maddin film--it was "Tales from Gimli Hospital." When it ended I sat quietly for a few moments and just muttered "Holy Cow" over and over. "Gimli" is an early and very low budget effort. "Careful" shows Guy nearing a peak that hopefully will go on for a few more decades.

Guy somehow (and miraculously) manages to sum up the entire history of cinema in his work. While there's much chatter about his obvious retro style, few have noticed his nods to Godard and more recent filmmakers. He may seem to mimic early films with missing frames and soundtrack problems but these "affectations" are ultimately as expressive as the equivalent jump cuts and soundtrack dropouts in Godard's "Alphaville." They're richer too because of the inevitable multiple associations. His amazing short, "Heart of the World" (one of the best shorts I've ever seen) owes as much to modern MTV editing styles as it does to early Soviet cinema (and creates a bridge and dialogue between two seemingly unrelated creative eras). Guy's not an artsy filmmaker, he's just a "guy" who loves movies passionately and works, unselfconsciously, with film's full lexicon.

"Careful" is a beautiful (often breathtakingly gorgeous), complex, unique, and very funny film. He's made a disturbing comedy about tragic and sensitive issues or maybe a tragedy about comic issues--there's something almost Shakespearean about his output. He also has a knack for getting memorable performances from his actors.

No this film isn't for everyone--right now at least--but I'm convinced we are currently witnessing the appearance of one of film's truly great creative geniuses. His films make one realize how stunningly shallow so many modern movies are, overburdened with flashy technologies like CGI, mandatory pop-cultural references, pretty people, and consumerism. His output is also a challenge to the equally bankrupt "underground" or "counter-culture." By avoiding every modern cliché, trend, anti-trend, technology, anti-technology, and pretense in his work he's giving us, in this film and others, timeless and (a rare thing these days) sublime works that are, even after all this lofty commentary, still pretty damned funny!

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Like a very funny and beautiful dream..., February 24, 2002

By 

Jay Dickson (Portland, OR) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Careful (DVD)

When I first saw this film at a special screening at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, the host described Guy Maddin as "Winnipeg's answer to David Lynch... that is, if David Lynch were as good as Guy Maddin." The praise might be just: there are lovely dreamlike effects in Maddin's film (especially this, one of his best) which are like nothing David Lynch ever achieved.

CAREFUL is a tribute to the great bergenfilms of the Weimar Republic, and is filmed with the same kinds of filmic effects and film stock as those lovely little hallucinations of the silent era. The film is largely about the joys of repression, and what disasters can be brought about without it. If you think I'm being facetious, you're wrong: in Maddin's deliriously offkilter Expressionist universe, every act of curiosity is sure to kill a cat, and everyone else besides.(the film's prologue, which explains all this, is one of the funniest things I've ever seen: "Careful, don't touch that pot!") Maddin's muse, the very gifted Kyle McCulloch, is on-hand as usual. This film can't be explained, but it also shouldn't be missed.

11 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of Maddin's best, March 27, 2009

By 

Ulalume Jones "Creative Gal" (Between Nothing and Nowhere) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Careful (Remastered and Repressed) (DVD)

This was the movie that introduced me to Guy Maddin. Guy Maddin is an acquired taste, like David Lynch or Alejandro Jodorowsky. I feel I have to defend the director from anyone who watches a film of his and can't be it because it is "weird". It is supposed to be that way. He makes movies in a futuristic Victorian way. I don't think he will ever have a large audience because of this. But I love his work, like I love Lynch or Jodorowsky. It's surreal, it's filmed like it's a film from the early 1900's, either in sepia, black and white or colored in sort of color.

Careful, is a pseudo-Victorian tale about, well, being careful, which means being repressed. Maddin takes the modern way of looking at things and adds them into this sort of moral tale. It's well acted, the colors are beautiful, I remember the color in the scene where they are riding across the sky very well done.

I would say if you only like normal films, like action and typical romantic comedies, you should probably steer clear of anything Maddin does. But if you like challenging film, you should watch this at least a few times. LEt it sink in. I feel Guy Maddin is a genius and one of my favorite directors, but I also love Rasputina and League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, which have the same steampunk sensibilities.