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Adelaide Leroux, Samuel Boidin, Henri Cretel, Jean-Marie Bruveart, David Poulain ... see more see more... , Patrice Venant , David Legay , Iain De Caestaecker , Inge Decaesteker

A man's reluctance to express his emotions has unfortunate consequences in both love and war in this drama from filmmaker Bruno Dumont. Barbe (Adelaide Leroux) is a pretty young woman living in a smal... read more read more...l village in rural France. Barbe loves Andre (Samuel Boidin), a rough-hewn farmhand who doesn't say much and isn't comfortable sharing his feelings for her in any way other than sex. Frustrated by Andre's inability to show affection, Barbe vents her anger by sleeping with other men, and when Andre is drafted into the Army, he finds Barbe is saying goodbye to another of her lovers, Blondel (Henri Cretel), at the same time she's saying farewell to him. Andre and Blondel find themselves serving in the same outfit as they're sent to an unnamed Middle Eastern nation, where the grim circumstances of war wears away their humanity as they rape and murder civilians. Meanwhile at home, Barbe discovers she's pregnant with Blondel's child, and begins experiencing a nervous breakdown. Flanders received its world premier at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Mark Deming, Rovi

Flixster Users

55% liked it

2,230 ratings

Critics

68% liked it

56 critics

Unrated, 1 hr. 31 min.

Directed by: Bruno Dumont

Release Date: May 18, 2007

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DVD Release Date: November 6, 2007

Stats: 112 reviews

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Flixster Reviews (112)

  • RossCollinsUK
    April 1, 2008
    RossCollinsUK
    An awfully slow French movie with minimalistic dialogue that adds nothing to the war-movie genre. If you really must see it, at least skip the first half-hour!
  • gor41
    January 2, 2008
    gor41
    Raw treatment of sex and death where little is said and shots last forever in typical french style. It improves when it moves to the theatre of war but it didn't have anything new to say particularly.
  • gator681
    June 26, 2008
    gator681
    [font=Century Gothic]With "Flanders," writer-director Bruno Dumont continues his examination of alienation in an isolated area, back on his home turf of France. Barbe(Adelaide Leroux) is a young woman who is watching the young men of the village go off to war, most of whom she h... read moreas had sex with(They have sex because they cannot possibly think of anything else to do. Acting out of boredom, it is over as quickly as it begins. No foreplay.), which includes her closest friend, Andre(Samuel Boidin). Of course, this is not the wisest course of action for a woman living in such a small community...[/font]
    [font=Century Gothic][/font]
    [font=Century Gothic]War seems a natural topic for Dumont as his movies have gotten progressively more violent. Without war, I do not think these characters' lives would ever change, eternally locked into the same routine. Fighting a largely unseen enemy in an unknown country(I would like to say Iraq but I do not think that is possible under the circumstances), the soldiers display the worst aspects of their personalities which include rage, racism and misogyny.[/font]
  • QueenCityFilms
    February 19, 2008
    QueenCityFilms
    while I appreciate its experimental approach, the end result doesn't come within a mile of being considered a worthwhile experience.

View All Flanders (Flandres) Reviews

Critic Reviews

Jonathan Rosenbaum
January 3, 2008
Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader

Dumont is much more confident when he sticks to the title town and the young woman the men left behind; his habit of alternating close shots with extreme long shots and his singularly unsentimental wa... Full Review

Roger Ebert
August 17, 2007
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

This film has few tangible pleasures, such as some somber shots of Demester walking far away in a field. Its achievement is theoretical. Full Review

Michael Phillips
August 16, 2007
Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune

The harsh and lovely achievement of Bruno Dumont's Flanders is its mixture of the concrete and the abstract. It isn't about a specific war. It's about conflict of every stripe, in any time. Full Review

Desson Thomson
July 26, 2007
Desson Thomson, Washington Post

French filmmaker Bruno Dumont urges his audience to delve beneath the movie's melodramatic, often graphic surface and experience the film sensorially rather than intellectually. Full Review

Wesley Morris
July 20, 2007
Wesley Morris, Boston Globe

This is not a film of youth or wisdom -- it's not even a film of real intelligence. And so we flit between war and relative peace, with no insight or feeling or compelling style. Full Review

Mick LaSalle
June 22, 2007
Mick LaSalle, San Francisco Chronicle

Don't fight this movie. Just release and get onto its wavelength. Full Review

Kevin Crust
June 8, 2007
Kevin Crust, Los Angeles Times

This deeply felt vision of the human condition has more resonance than yet another movie concluding that war is hell. Full Review

Andrew Sarris
May 23, 2007
Andrew Sarris, New York Observer

From the evidence of Flanders, Mr. Dumont's career demands further study on my part should the opportunity arise. Full Review

V.A. Musetto
May 22, 2007
V.A. Musetto, New York Post

Bruno Dumont. You either love the French filmmaker's abstract and minimalist approach, or you hate it. Count me among the former. Full Review

Stephen Holden
May 18, 2007
Stephen Holden, New York Times

Whether you like or loathe Mr. Dumont's movies, his unsettling vision of humanity stripped of cultural finery feels profoundly truthful. Beneath the facade of civilization, life is a barnyard.

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