Germinal (1993)

It's mid 19th century in northern France. The story is about a coal miner's town. The workers are exploited by the mine's owner. One day, they decide to go on strike, and the authorities repress them.

Director:

Claude Berri

Writers:

Claude Berri, Arlette Langmann,

Stars:

Miou-Miou, Renaud, Jean Carmet

2 wins & 10 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Miou-Miou	...	Maheude
Renaud	...	Étienne Lantier
Jean Carmet	...	Vincent Maheu dit Bonnemort
Judith Henry	...	Catherine Maheu
Jean-Roger Milo	...	Chaval
Gérard Depardieu	...	Toussaint Maheu
Laurent Terzieff	...	Souvarine
Bernard Fresson	...	Victor Deneulin
Jean-Pierre Bisson	...	Rasseneur
Jacques Dacqmine	...	Philippe Hennebeau
Anny Duperey	...	Madame Hennebeau
Gérard Croce	...	Maigrat
Frédéric van den Driessche	...	Paul Négrel
Annick Alane	...	Madame Grégoire
Pierre Lafont	...	Léon Grégoire

Storyline

It's mid 19th century, north of France. The story of a coal miner's town. They are exploited by the mine's owner. One day the decide to go on strike, and then the authorities repress them

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Plot Keywords:

coal miner | strike | mine owner | mine | coal | 

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Genres:

Drama | Romance

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

France Belgium Italy

Language:

French

Release Date:

March 1994 (USA)

Also Known As:

De mijn

Filming Locations:

Nord, France

Box Office

Gross:

$378,854 (USA)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Renn Productions, France 2 Cinéma, DD Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

160 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby SR

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Goofs

Near the end of the film, when Etienne and Catherine are looking for the way out of the mine, we see the shadows of the lamps on the right wall of the tunnel. It's to be supposed that the only light inside the mine came from the lamps.

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Quotes

Etienne Lantier: Capitalist tyranny is destroying us.

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Connections

Version of Germinal; or, The Toll of Labor (1913)

User Reviews

A decent attempt at a complex story

Tackling a book such as Germinal is a mammoth task - and one that I always thought was extremely difficult to transfer onto the big screen.

There are two ways you can do it, keep it simple or explore everything and bore the audience to death. You can see here that the director has decided to keep the story as simple and straightforward as possible.

This means there are a few gaping holes in the film, as it ignores some of the intricacies of the story and many of the sub-plots which punctuate the story and add to the feel of the book.

In one sense he succeeds, as the tempo of the film is high and it rattles along at a fair pace, not reading like a 2 and a half hour story.

But the major drawback of this tactic is that Germinal ends up looking like a simplistic noble workers versus the greedy bosses story, when the novel is anything but that.

Scorn is poured on both sides with equal contempt by Zola, and plenty of sympathy is given to some of the "wealthy" protaganists in the book.

Having said this, I do understand that in order to keep the film from turning into a 4 hour behemoth, you need to try and keep it as simple as possible.

On the whole, however, it is pretty well acted and the art direction is utterly breathtaking. The villages, the pits, the landscapes, the mines are fabulously shot. You really can feel the poverty oozing from every inch of the screen.

Gerard Depardieu (Maheu) and Renaud (Ettiene) put in some pretty convincing turns but feel that Jean-Roger Milo rather over-egged Chaval, turning him into some pseudo incredible hulk type character who is incapable of speaking normally. Judith Henry also seems a little to young and fresh faced to play Catherine.

I think I let my interpretation of the book cloud my judgement, and as a result I was disappointed because I expected more from the film than I should have.

Rating: 3 out of 5