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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Flat-out my favorite film of the 90s, December 1, 2000
By A Customer
This review is from: La Promesse [VHS] (VHS Tape)
If you haven't seen this one, well... Its emotional impact on me was devastating. I saw it when it opened, and a friend and I, who are normally quite talkative after a good movie, walked at least two city blocks afterwards before either of us said a word. I compare it in style to "The Dreamlife of Angels" (hand-held cameras, naturalistic acting, a plot that unfolds gradually and builds to a harrowing finale, and no musical score) and in theme to, of all things, "The Apartment" (main character is waist-deep in wrongdoing but has a crisis of conscience that forces him to re-evaluate himself and his actions). Please find a copy somehow, or go ahead and spend the money here -- I don't want Amazon to get angry with me.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Best of 1998, February 17, 2000
This review is from: La Promesse [VHS] (VHS Tape)
This is not a warm fuzzy picture by any means, but it is film for people who love people and appreciate the higher instincts of mankind that transcend nationality, race, gender, and age. Does one follow instinctual bonds to family, or honor and committment to a worthy promise. I absolutely loved this film...and so did my Parisian friends to whom I recommended it.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Promise Keeper!, July 29, 2009
Belgium documentary film makers Jean-Pierre and Luc Dardenne deliver an unflinching glimpse into the horrors and exploitation of undocumented workers and the opportunistic people who prey on them in order to improve their own sordid, wretched lives. The directors also have an amazing eye for casting as all the actors are so natural that you think you are watching a documentary, rather than a compassionate piece of fiction. The heart and soul of the piece is Igor portrayed by a stunning looking fifteen year old Jérémie Rénier ( Summer Hours (The Criterion Collection) [Blu-ray]) in an amazing first performance. Every good story needs a great villain and here it supplied by Igor's father Roger in a bravura performance by Olivier Gourmet ( Rosetta [Region 2 Import - Non USA Format]). The lying, cheating, brutal Roger exploits everyone near him and even though he loves him, poor Igor is no exception. The motherless boy has been pulled out of school under the pretense of an apprenticeship so his dad can use him to help run the family business of human trafficking. Absent of any moral teachings or decent role model, Igor is no angel himself:an expert forger of fake identities, purse snatcher, and lying to immigration officers. However, he is still a mechanically inclined 12 year old who snatches a few precious minutes to work on a motorized soap box type car with his friends and paints his dingy teeth with white-out to mimic the dazzling smiles of the Africans whose passports he is altering. Igor is placed in an almost untenable position when he "promises" to care for the wife and child of a dying African man under his supervision. This promise causes an almost spiritual awakening in our young protagonist and forces him to make difficult moral choices for the first time in his own exploited life. Sadly, the film ends on a very ambiguous note but one hopes the protagonist will have a better, more hopeful future due to living up to his word.
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