Coeurs 2006

Michael Wilmington, Chicago Tribune: A film about love and blunders done from the perspective of age, crafted by writer Alan Ayckbourn, 68, and director Alain Resnais, 85. Our younger directors and screenwriters should show this much brilliance and feeling. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: It's a Parisian romantic roundelay with sundry couples connecting and disconnecting, but it looks and sounds like no sex comedy ever made: It's transcendentally yummy. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: New Wave stalwart Resnais (Hiroshima, Mon Amour) hasn't lost a step with age, and his decision to shroud the action in constant snowfall gives the film a surprisingly magical air. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: Few filmmakers portray emotional detachment so achingly well. Read more

Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times: Private Fears in Public Places, a masterpiece by any measure, is fresh, immediate and contemporary, but its wintry yet warm perspective is suffused with the wisdom and experience of a great filmmaker who turns 85 on June 2. Read more

Jonathan Rosenbaum, Chicago Reader: Resnais has always been an expressionist, using his settings and compositions to evoke the inner states of his characters. Here, tying expressionism to social critique, he becomes an improbable but unmistakable blood brother of Carl Dreyer. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: [A] mature adaptation of a dramatic daisy chain by veteran British playwright Alan Ayckbourn. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: Alain Resnais turns this multi-character tale of misspent love into pure cinema, transforming the physical world into a symbolic statement about divisions, distances and separation anxiety. Read more

Lisa Rose, Newark Star-Ledger: French art films aren't generally known for their feel-good endings, but a total lack of resolution can be just as cloying as happily ever after. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: The film is beautifully shot and edited, but these emotional snapshots won't stay long in the memory. Read more

V.A. Musetto, New York Post: At an age when most people are reduced to waiting for the Grim Reaper, Resnais is challenging life as if he were half a century younger. Read more

Steven Rea, Philadelphia Inquirer: Read more

Andrew O'Hehir, Salon.com: Something about Resnais' rigorous attention to the tiniest detail, his infinitesimal flourishes of surrealism and the metrical precision of Eric Gautier's camerawork -- not to mention the terrific cast of French cinema veterans -- finally sucked me in. Read more

Ruthe Stein, San Francisco Chronicle: Private Fears suffers from [director Alain] Resnais' inability to open it up and give it the look and pulse of a film. Read more

Bill Stamets, Chicago Sun-Times: Resnais shapes affecting performances from a polished cast. He creates a warm, comic melancholy. Read more

Ben Kenigsberg, Time Out: Read more

Geoff Andrew, Time Out: The tenderness with which Resnais observes their efforts makes for genuinely enchanting entertainment. Read more

David Fear, Time Out: Unlike most interconnected ensemble pieces, closure never comes. This gambit makes the talky tragicomedy work despite the affectations; a determination to end well without all being well somehow feels like just the right move. Read more

Jay Weissberg, Variety: Despite a perfect cast of Resnais regulars plus the master's own impeccable crafting, the characters fail to grip, and with approximately 50 short scenes, development comes in fits and starts. Read more

Jim Ridley, Village Voice: Lowbrow plus highbrow does not equal middlebrow, and the breezy accessibility of Private Fears in Public Places does not make it any less a work of art than Resnais's more difficult early successes. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: What reaches us, most of all, are the hidden, unmet longings that keep the film's Parisian characters from finding true happiness. Read more