Sorry, this item is not available in
Image not available for
Color:
Image not available

To view this video download Flash Player

 
Buy New

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
Buy Used
Used - Very Good See details
$5.44 & FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
Sold by arrow-media.

or
Sign in to turn on 1-Click ordering.
 
   
Sell Us Your Item
For up to a $1.05 Gift Card
Trade in
More Buying Choices
Movies@Home Add to Cart
$6.22  & FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
Billa Bong Dreams Add to Cart
$8.50  & FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
discountedm... Add to Cart
$9.79  & FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
Have one to sell? Sell yours here

The Painted Veil (2007)

Naomi Watts , Edward Norton , John Curran  |  PG-13 |  DVD
4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (479 customer reviews)

List Price: $19.96
Price: $6.12 & FREE Shipping on orders over $25. Details
You Save: $13.84 (69%)
o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o o
In Stock.
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com. Gift-wrap available.
Want it tomorrow, May 23? Choose One-Day Shipping at checkout. Details
Watch Instantly with Prime Members Rent Buy
The Painted Veil
$0.00
$2.99 $9.99

Other Formats & Versions

Amazon Price New from Used from
Blu-ray 1-Disc Version $30.69  
DVD 1-Disc Version $6.12  
Up to 65% Off Select Movies on DVD & Blu-ray
Save big on select all-time favorites on DVD and Blu-ray, including "Gone with the Wind," "The Goonies," and "Harry Potter."

Special Offers and Product Promotions

  • Gift Wrap
    Leave the Wrapping to Us
    Sending a gift? Save yourself a little time this Father's Day by taking advantage of gift wrapping for just $3.99. We'll select from our coordinating papers, boxes, and ribbons to make your gift special. Note: Large items might arrive in a reusable cloth gift bag instead of wrapping paper. Learn more

Frequently Bought Together

The Painted Veil + The Illusionist (Widescreen Edition)
Price for both: $11.12

Buy the selected items together

What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?


Product Details

  • Actors: Naomi Watts, Edward Norton, Liev Schreiber
  • Directors: John Curran
  • Format: Widescreen, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Surround Sound, Anamorphic, NTSC
  • Language: English (Dolby Digital 5.1)
  • Subtitles: English, Spanish, French
  • Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Rated: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
  • Studio: Warner Home Video
  • DVD Release Date: May 8, 2007
  • Run Time: 125 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (479 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B000NOIX48
  • Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,514 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
  • Learn more about "The Painted Veil" on IMDb

Special Features

None.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Produced by Edward Norton and Naomi Watts, The Painted Veil works well as a movie--even better as an actor's showcase. The year is 1925. When her domineering mother pressures her to marry, Kitty (Watts) settles for shy bacteriologist Walter (Norton). Then Walter is transferred from London to Shanghai and the lonely and bored Kitty drifts into an affair with married diplomat Charlie (Liev Schreiber). When Walter finds out, he makes a startling proposition: either Kitty accompanies him to the cholera-infested countryside or he'll divorce her. With no other prospects, she comes along on what looks like a double-suicide mission. Based on the novel by W. Somerset Maugham, The Painted Veil was adapted by Philadelphia's Ron Nyswaner (who knows a little something about infectious diseases). As two previous versions made little impact--despite Garbo's presence in the 1934 melodrama--John Curran's film is sure to stand as definitive. Interestingly, Norton, who studied Chinese history at Yale, chose Watts as his co-star, while Watts chose Curran, for whom she appeared in 2004's underrated We Don't Live Here Anymore. Filmed on location, the handsome production is, in many respects, just as old-fashioned as its source material--sex is merely suggested and Kitty is shocked that their English neighbor (Toby Jones) has a Chinese lover--but the ending packs a feminist twist. Mostly though, The Painted Veil is about the acting, and Watts and Norton, along with Diana Rigg as a disillusioned Mother Superior, have rarely been better. --Kathleen C. Fennessy

Product Description

Based on the classic novel by W. Somerset Maugham, "The Painted Veil" is a love story set in the 1920s that tells the story of a young English couple, Walter, a middle class doctor and Kitty, an upper-class woman, who get married for the wrong reasons and relocate to Shanghai, where she falls in love with someone else. When he uncovers her infidelity, in an act of vengeance, he accepts a job in a remote village in China ravaged by a deadly epidemic, and takes her along. Their journey brings meaning to their relationship and gives them purpose in one of the most remote and beautiful places on earth.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
261 of 275 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars 'Painted Veil' Is Beautiful February 11, 2007
Co-produced and co-starring Naomi Watts and Edward Norton, W. Somerset Maugham's novel comes to life in living color. Beautiful cinematography and symphonic music embellish a wonderful, heart-warming story of love and forgiveness.

Kitty (Watts) is getting older. Living in 1920's London, her parents have more to say with impunity about her suitors. Quick to pursue her, Walter Fane (Norton) pushes himself for courtship against her wishes, but the timing leaves her no choice but wedlock. Interrupted in their social life, they become a foursome with Charlie Townsend (Liev Schreiber) and his wife. Charlie, a virile alternative to her drab, doctor husband, tempts her into adultery. In such an arrangement, women didn't have the freedoms they do now. So when Walter is assigned to treat a cholera epidemic in Shanghai, he's privy to her affair and can blackmail her to come along or face the scorn of divorce. Since her lover is a playboy who abhors attachment anyway, she again has no choice.

Life in China at first offers nothing more than disease and disenchantment. Bored with her life and keeping in seclusion to avoid cholera, her husband spreads nothing but flinty resentment toward her unfaithful presence. Besides a stunning landscape, she discovers a convent where a wise, old mother superior charms her heart and inspires her to do at first repellant work with the orphans. Besides the dangers of disease, the locals are slow to warm up to any foreigner's presence, even one that may offer a solution to their health crisis.

More moving than its beautiful cinematography, Norton's and Watt's splendid performances work well with a captivating story of lust and love, betrayal and forgiveness, and selfishness turned to self-giving. While some viewers may find some of the old-fashioned elements of the film languorous in places, I feel the picture clocks in just right for the state of affairs. Superbly crafted, 'Painted Veil' is complete with a heart-melting beauty for the soul as well as for the eyes.
Was this review helpful to you?
107 of 110 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars Painted with bright and dark colors. September 24, 2007
Format:DVD
Don't let my 5 stars fool you into thinking that I think all will love this film; however, I did.

This film is not to everyone's taste, but I found it extraordinary. This kind of film typically attracts those who like films like The English Patient (which I hated) and The Horse Whisperer (which I loved). This is a period piece that doesn't need its period to be relevant. This is a location film that doesn't need its location to be believable. This is a slow-moving story that doesn't need action to be engrossing. This is a masterpiece that doesn't need improvement.

The story is both simple and multi-layered. Naomi Watts, totally unrecognizable from her The Ring and King Kong films, is basically a spoiled brat who would prefer to live off her father's money than to buy into the trappings of marriage (as she sees it). In a moment of spiteful rage against her mother, she intentionally marries a "civil servant" (one viewed beneath her), extremely well-played by Edward (American History X) Norton who equally disappears into his role as a shy man who is rather infatuated with Watts but respectful of the fact she doesn't love him, but hopes she will one day over time. This is a time when arranged marriages were common and for a husband to be as respectful as Norton's role is refreshing. He never forces himself on his wife and she does eventually warm up to him, but considers him a terrible bore.

No spoiler here to mention that the first interesting man that comes along, Liev Schreiber who is effectively self-centered, she beds in her own home. Later, to her surprise, her husband is not only not a blind fool like she thought, but is keenly aware of how people react to situations and has a better understanding of the more base emotions than his self-centered wife. For all her so-called worldly wisdom, she can't read emotions or people very well at all and has little understanding of the consequences of her own actions as she blames the man she willingly married (to spite her mom) for her own affair because he wasn't interesting to her.

In what appears to be retaliation for his wife's callous indiscretion, Norton, who has been quiet and respectful, comes down hard on his wife and volunteers to become a doctor in a remote town in China where they are dropping like flies due to an infectious illness. He knows it may spell certain death to both of them. He offers her the choice of an ugly discrediting divorce for infidelity, which will bring down her politician lover, or go with him. In this time period, that is no choice at all. She goes with him and, at first, we believe him to be incredibly cruel in doing this until we see him at work.

We identify more with Watt's shock at going to this deadly village and are appalled that Norton would do this as "punishment" regardless of the terrible thing she did to him, but we gradually learn that he is actually motivated to save others even at great risk to himself and he had been planning this for awhile and at a time when he might have been able to trust his wife to not have affairs. In addition, either intentionally or unintentionally, we are never sure, Norton gets his wife to see something admirable in him. He may have seemed initially cruel to his wife and he may well have intended this trip as some kind of punishment to both he and his wife, however, he is a multi-layered character who consistently surprises us (and his wife). So much for being "boring."

To give away more would spoil the story, but this is a memorable film that is touching and honest in how it deals with our basic human emotions of love, hate, jealousy, and personal desires. I highly recommend this film, but I'm aware that this kind of story may not appeal to everyone. Even if this is not your typical genre, give it a try. You have nothing to lose but two hours of time and everything to gain by having your deepest emotions touched.
Was this review helpful to you?
120 of 129 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars Serene brilliance February 5, 2007
Some stories portray life in many shades and make all the shades look equally remarkable, even though some shades are bright and some are truly gloomy. The Painted Veil is an outstanding example of such a versatlie story. The movie brilliantly narrates the lives of a couple who marry to pursue conflicting goals and end up uniting in every way. Ed Norton and Naomi Watts deliver one of the best performances of their lives and leave the audience spell bound in a movie that boasts of nothing dramatic and yet is a drama in the purest form. Set in England and China of 1920's, this movie depicts the love, the lack of it, and again the love between a couple whose pursuits were different but led them to one goal. To sum it, The Painted Veil is a sedate, sober and yet stunningly beautiful movie that will engage and enthrall you.
Comment | 
Was this review helpful to you?
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Superb
Moving and beautiful drama with fantastic acting. It makes you cry! Soundtrack and setting equally beautiful. Probably in my top 5 favorite movies of all time.
Published 4 hours ago by Elizabeth Walsh
5.0 out of 5 stars Great story and acting with a value-based message
I thoroughly enjoyed the movie. The story was intriguing and set in a time and era from which we seem far removed but not so. Naomi Watts was spectacular in evolving her character. Read more
Published 6 hours ago by G. Gwin
4.0 out of 5 stars Painted veil
Solid acting by the ensemble, good cinematography and beautiful setting, but also showed realism in depicting the difficult life of the peasants. Based on the novel by W. Read more
Published 9 hours ago by James Cole
4.0 out of 5 stars Haunting and Beautiful
I am huge fan of Edward Norton and I really like this move. The scenery is amazing! The acting superb! A must see!
Published 2 days ago by Michelle McKinney
5.0 out of 5 stars Worth It
This film came out a year ago. I never heard of it before but thought I'd take a chance. A very pleasant surprise. Edward Norton hits it on the head again. Read more
Published 2 days ago by Gift Card Recipient
4.0 out of 5 stars Surprised
Was pleasantly surprised by this movie, it kept me in the story, my husband even enjoyed it. Hadn't really heard of it before
Published 3 days ago by L. Best
3.0 out of 5 stars Sweet coming of age Story
Although a little slow, the story captures you and makes you evolve and grow up with the character. A bitter sweet tale of the hard work, challenges, and devotion that go into... Read more
Published 3 days ago by Srdsmdmad
4.0 out of 5 stars Painted veil
Drama romance Great chic flick great scenery of china and London, very real story plot and characters are also very real
Published 4 days ago by Bones az
3.0 out of 5 stars The Story line was good and certainly factual
There was a couple of scenes that were not suitable for a lot of us old fogies.

reconsider a rating
Published 4 days ago by Don Teitzel
5.0 out of 5 stars EPIC, EXQUISITE, TRULY EXTRAORDINARY
A visceral tale of human faults and human brilliance. Performances so nuanced, so utterly real and compassionate; this is a spectacular classic that can never and will never fade... Read more
Published 4 days ago by DigitalPaperCut
Search Customer Reviews
Only search this product's reviews


Forums

Topic From this Discussion
Garbo version
I read that too. Do you believe it??? How come I cannot find any information about this??? I have seen this before with Warner Bros. Remember when "The Letter" with Bette Davis was suppose to have the Jeanne Eagels version on it also?? And most recently I had read "The Prisoner of... Read more
Apr 14, 2007 by James P. Gaddis |  See all 3 posts
Have something you'd like to share about this product?
Start a new discussion
Topic:
First post:
Prompts for sign-in
 


Search Customer Discussions
Search all Amazon discussions


Look for Similar Items by Category