THE WELL-DIGGER'S DAUGHTER
Returning to the glory of French Heritage Cinema, Daniel Auteuil, veteran actor and new director, turns to the world of Marcel Pagnol to remake the 1940s classic. The first of a series of films revisiting and remaking Pagnol, THE WELL DIGGER'S DAUGHTER is exceptional French cinema, beautiful composed, sublimely acted, superbly directed. Auteuil has long been a fixture of the French Heritage tradition in film as the star of JEAN DE FLORETTE and MANON OF THE SPRING twenty-five years earlier, and his return is truly a gift. This film screened in a limited release in March as part of the RENDEZ-VOUS with FRENCH CINEMA series and now is your second chance to see this instant classic.
"The humanist spirit of Gallic novelist-director Marcel Pagnol is alive and well in the old-fashionedly sincere THE WELL-DIGGER'S DAUGHTER."
-Boyd van Hoeij, VARIETY
"Let THE WELL DIGGER'S DAUGHTER take you back in time, not once but several times over."
-Kenneth Turan, LOS ANGELES TIMES
"What resonates is a sense of humanity that sometimes gets lost in films with less regard for traditional storytelling, or respect for simple emotion."
-John Anderson, NEWSDAY
Auteuil stars as the eponymous well-digger Pascale, a widower living with his six daughters in the Provence countryside at the start of World War I. His eldest, Patricia (the luminous Astrid Bergès-Frisbey), has returned home from Paris to help raise her sisters, and Pascale dreams of marrying her off to his loyal assistant Felipe (Kad Merad). But when she's impregnated by a wealthy young pilot (Nicolas Duvauchelle) who promptly abandons her for the frontlines, Pascale is left to contend with the consequences.
Directed by Daniel Auteuil. Unrated.
France, 2012, 35mm Film, 105minutes, Color, French with English Subtitles.