Product Details

• Actors: Catherine Deneuve
• Directors: Roman Polanski
• Format: Anamorphic, Black & White, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rating: Unrated
• Studio: Criterion
• DVD Release Date: July 28, 2009
• Run Time: 105 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (120 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B0026VBOK6
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #23,560 in Movies & TV (See Bestsellers in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "Repulsion- Criterion Collection" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com essential video

Roman Polanski was still a newcomer to the world of cinema when he unleashed this unforgettable exercise in skin-crawling terror. Repulsion was the Polish director's first film in English, but that hardly mattered: much of the movie is as wordless (and as weird) as the silent Nosferatu. The young Catherine Deneuve plays a Belgian girl stranded in '60s London, a shy beauty with no social skills. When her sister leaves their shared flat, Deneuve goes gradually, quietly, completely mad. Her world becomes Polanski's paintbox, as the devilish director distorts reality via a series of surrealistic touches (grasping hands that protrude from elastic walls) and out-and-out murderous horror. Very few films cast the kind of eerie spell that this 1965 classic achieves, and it clearly points the way toward Polanski's Rosemary's Baby. As with most of the director's work, what is unsettling is not the overt violence, but the terrifying sense of emptiness and isolation, and the boiling unease inside one's own mind. --Robert Horton

Product Description

Roman Polanski followed up his international breakthrough, Knife in the Water, with this controversial, chilling tale of psychosis, starring Catherine Deneuve as Carole, a fragile, frigid young beauty cracking up over the course of a terrifying weekend. Left alone by her vacationing sister in their London flat, Carole is haunted by specters real and imagined, and her insanity grows to a violent pitch. Thanks to its unforgettable attention to disturbing detail and Polanski’s unparalleled adeptness at turning claustrophobic space into an emotional minefield, Repulsion remains one of cinema’s most shocking psychological thrillers.

SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES:

• New, restored high-definition digital transfer

• Audio commentary featuring director Roman Polanski and actress Catherine Deneuve

• A British Horror Film (2003), a documentary on the making of Repulsion, featuring interviews with Polanski, producer Gene Gutowski, and cinematographer Gil Taylor

• A 1964 television documentary filmed on the set of Repulsion, featuring rare footage of Polanski and Deneuve at work

• Theatrical trailer

• PLUS: A booklet featuring an essay by film scholar and curator Bill Horrigan

Stills from Repulsion (Click for larger image)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

33 of 39 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Superb--and Terrifying--Psychological Examination, March 5, 1999

By	"professionalhomo" (San Diego, CA) - See all my reviews

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

Roman Polanski's first English language film, made three years following the international acclaim for "Knife in the Water" and three years before his American masterpiece "Rosemary's Baby," is a marvelous dissection of paranoia and sexual psychosis amidst contemporary culture, with a phenomenally subtle, moving performance by Catherine Deneuve and camerawork so coldly precise that the horror seems to bloom naturally from the mundane landscape of the film. Deneuve plays Carole Ledoux, a Belgian beautician who lives in London with her frivolous sister. When the sister and her married boyfriend leave to vacation together in Italy, Carole begins to isolate herself in her apartment in a sexual and violent frenzy. The movie becomes more and more subjective as Polanski plunges into Carole's mind and her psychoses, but what's stunning about Polanski's dissection of Carole's consciousness is the way that the director moves so brusquely from an objective perspective into his protagonist's fears without bluntly heralding the transition. We've already become part of Carole's awareness before we realize it. In this sense, "Repulsion" mirrors both Luis Bunuel's "Belle de Jour" and "Un Chien Andalou" in its precise, logical progression that expresses what is in fact illogical. The movie never feels like it's caught up in dream logic whatsoever--it's all starkly real and flat, until the scene reveals itself to be a subjective or illusory perception. This idea that Polanski can thrust us into the mind of his protagonist before we're ever really aware of the fact that we're in a subjective reality becomes more and more frightening as the film progresses, making us complicit in the camera's perspective. Terrifying, too, is Deneuve's ability to make us both afraid of Carole and for her; because Polanski and Deneuve craft Carole as an aggressor who perceives herself as a victim, "Repulsion" forces us (indeed, right into its final frame) to reevaluate our relation to Carole and renders our position as spectators horrifyingly uneasy. Polanski didn't match this kind of expert craftsmanship until 1974 in "Chinatown"--itself one of the two or three greatest films ever made.

39 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Gives cinematic expression to madness, December 15, 2003

By	Ian Muldoon (Coffs Harbour, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)

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

The film begins with the shot of an eye (of the actor Catherine Deneuve) beginning with the pupil and slowly moving out, and the film ends with a shot of the same eye, albeit taken from a family snapshot of the protagonist as a young girl, which snapshot has been on display on the sideboard in the flat where the psychological breakdown of, and murders committed by, the character occur. There is a famous eye shot in an early silent film involving Salvador Dali where an eye (of a sheep) is cut by a razor. REPULSION too features eyes and razors in abundance. And it is the accumulation of many such details which reveal Mr Polanski's deep knowledge of cinematic art. For example, the three street musicians, and their music, could have walked straight from a Fellini set. The use of wide-angled lenses and the consequent distortions disturbing to the viewer and the brilliant use of chiascuro, shadows, light used as sculpture, and the long corridors of light and dark suggest German expressionist cinema in the tradition of "Dr Caligari". As well the masterful use of SOUND including that by jazz musician Chico Hamilton is quite powerful. For example, the attack by the protagonist, dressed in her nightgown, slashing at the man with another man's cut-throat razor is given incredible power by the drumming of Mr Hamilton and is an interesting comparison with the screeching violins of Bernard Hermann in the shower scene in Psycho. Or the weird arco bass and shimmering cymbals when the ceiling cracks before her very eyes. Otherwise, ordinary sounds, such as the nearby bells in a convent, dripping tap water, a clock, flies, become a tintinnabulation of horror. Not a film to see alone. Do not watch if having suffered any mental illness however minor. I would call this one of the more telling examples of "total" cinema, by which I mean every element of the film goes towards creating a powerful feeling in the viewer - a premier example of experiencing what the central character herself is experiencing. One of the greatest.

18 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars the definitive psychological horror film, April 18, 2001

By	"cardinals4ever" (KY, USA) - See all my reviews

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

Repulsion is the mother of all psychological horror movies.Catherine Deneuve's performance is remarkable.Don't expect "halloween" type scares from this movie.This is about a beautiful young woman who slowly loses her mind after her sister goes away on a trip for a few days.The horror of this movie comes from the cracks on the wall,cracks in the pavement,and a rabbit.So if you are a big "scream" fan this probably isnt for you.I'm also a fan of the "halloween" type horror genre,but i've noticed many other fans of that kind just dont seem to understand what psychological horror movies are all about.Therefore they might find repulsion unwatchable...probably for the same reasons I can watch it over and over.To be simple,if you're looking for cheap scares stay far away from repulsion.But if you want the most amazing psychological horror movie of all time then repulsion is for you.Besides, watching a stunningly beautiful Catherine Deneuve slowly lose it and do some shocking things is pretty easy on the eyes.I rank repulsion as my #1 all time horror movie.