Product Details

• Actors: Erich Von Stroheim, Jean Gabin, Jean Dasté, Pierre Fresnay, Marcel Dalio
• Directors: Jean Renoir
• Format: AC-3, Black & White, Dolby, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC, Subtitled
• Language: French
• Subtitles: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Criterion Collection
• DVD Release Date: September 9, 2008
• Run Time: 114 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B001BEK8DI
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #14,567 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

GRAND ILLUSION:ESSENTIAL ART HOUSE - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Representing humanity over war..., November 30, 2009

By 

Edmonson (Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Grand Illusion: Essential Art House (DVD)

"The Grand Illusion" (1937) could mean to represent many things. As one of the escapees mentions at the end, nature has no borders, those are artificial things made by people. Mankind creates many illusions, and Renoir invites us to ask what is the grandest illusion of them all. The film deals with many aspects of class, ethnicity, language, and focuses on the arbitrariness of these differences. These people all know that the war will end, and that a new era will be ushered in that will be more democratic, and that the age of aristocracies will come to an end.

The film is a realist fantasy that Jean Renoir created which focused on the humanity, and friendships, of the people. We don't really see much in the way of fighting, or any other such things, which are common to most war films. The little fighting that does occur lacks any of the drama often depicted in war films. The drama of war is not glorified here since it has no value for Renoir. He is interested in the people, not the drama of war. Goebbels cited the movie as being the "Cinematic Public Enemy No.1". This film was dangerous for the German war effort because it showed that those who were not German were human too. For Renoir, war, and its creation of false beliefs and goals, was a grand illusion.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Anti-War Movie That Hasn't Prevented Any Wars, October 18, 2010

By 

Stephanie DePue (Carolina Beach, NC USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Grand Illusion: Essential Art House (DVD)

"The Grand Illusion," ("La Grande Illusion") (1937) is a war drama, another of the classic black and white masterpieces of the French cinema. It stars the magnetic Jean Gabin (Essential Art House: Le Jour se Lève); and was directed by that acclaimed master, Jean Renoir(Jean Renoir 3-Disc Collector's Edition (Whirlpool of Fate / Nana / Charleston Parade / La Marseillaise / The Doctor's Horrible Experiment / The Elusive Corporal)): he of the painterly eye, son of the world-famous, greatly-loved, impressionist artist Pierre Auguste Renoir.

It concerns two French soldiers -- blue-collar Lt. Maréchal (Gabin), and genteel Capt. de Boieldieu (Pierre Fresnay--The Fanny Trilogy) who strive to overcome their differences while plotting their escape from German prisoner of war camps during World War I. Meanwhile, de Boieldieu finds a kindred spirit among his captors in a patrician German officer Capt Von Rauffenstein (an unforgettable performance by actor/director Erich von Stroheim--Five Graves to Cairo [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - Spain ]). Marcel Dalio (so significant as the casino dealer in Casablanca (Snap Case)) costars as Lt. Rosenthal, a wealthy French Jew, and a friend of Marechal's. It also boasts a passel of one-name actors, presumably from the Comedie Francaise. It's genre film-making at its best, considered one of the first prison-break movies ever made, and one of the finest anti-war movies ever made.

Jean Renoir was a Communist and a humanist who looked at the proletariat with an unusually sympathetic eye, and if this magnificent film does anything, it clearly lays out the rigid class distinctions of the period. The acting is uniformly topnotch. It is, of course, beautifully and expressively filmed: the scenes in the ancient castle, retrofitted to be what was considered to be an impossible to escape prisoner of war camp, where Rauffenstein rules, are simply superb. It also illustrates one more time, though it was hardly needed, that Gabin was catnip to women. Renoir has been quoted as saying that people told him he made a great anti-war movie in 1937, but movies clearly don't have any influence on real life, because three years later World War II, the most destructive of all wars, broke out. However, the fact that "Grand Illusion" hasn't prevented any wars doesn't mean that you shouldn't see it.

4 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Said to be one of the best films of all time, April 4, 2009

By 

ChamisaLady (New Mexico, USA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Grand Illusion: Essential Art House (DVD)

I've seen this several times and will see it many more. As video format technology changes, this is one of the ones I buy again and again. Drama, suspense, humor, chivalry, and a splash of romance are all here, wonderfully acted and brilliantly directed.