Arnaud Desplechin

A Christmas Tale

A Christmas Tale

In Arnaud Desplechin’s beguiling A Christmas Tale (Un conte de Noël), Catherine Deneuve brings her legendary poise to the role of Junon, matriarch of the troubled Vuillard family, who come together at Christmas after she learns she needs a bone marrow transplant from a blood relative. That simple family reunion setup, however, can’t begin to describe the unpredictable, emotionally volatile experience of this film, an inventive, magical drama that’s equal parts merriment and melancholy. Unrequited childhood loves and blinding grudges, brutal outbursts and sudden slapstick, music, movies, and poetry, A Christmas Tale ties it all together in a marvelously messy package.

Film Info

  • France
  • 2008
  • 152 minutes
  • Color
  • 2.35:1
  • French
  • Spine #492

DIRECTOR-APPROVED BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised by director Arnaud Desplechin, with DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
  • L’aimée, Desplechin’s 2007 documentary about the selling of his family home
  • Arnaud's Tale, a new 35-minute documentary featuring interviews with Desplechin and actors Mathieu Amalric and Catherine Deneuve
  • Original theatrical trailers
  • New and improved English subtitle translation
  • PLUS: A new essay by critic Philip Lopate

    New cover by Rodrigo Corral

Purchase Options

DIRECTOR-APPROVED BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised by director Arnaud Desplechin, with DTS-HD Master Audio soundtrack
  • L’aimée, Desplechin’s 2007 documentary about the selling of his family home
  • Arnaud's Tale, a new 35-minute documentary featuring interviews with Desplechin and actors Mathieu Amalric and Catherine Deneuve
  • Original theatrical trailers
  • New and improved English subtitle translation
  • PLUS: A new essay by critic Philip Lopate

    New cover by Rodrigo Corral
A Christmas Tale
Cast
Catherine Deneuve
Junon
Jean-Paul Roussillon
Abel
Mathieu Amalric
Henri
Anne Consigny
Elizabeth
Melvil Poupaud
Ivan
Emmanuelle Devos
Faunia
Chiara Mastroianni
Sylvia
Emile Berling
Paul
Hippolyte Girardot
Claude
Laurent Capelluto
Simon
Credits
Director
Arnaud Desplechin
Screenplay
Arnaud Desplechin
Screenplay
Emmanuel Bourdieu
Producer
Pascal Caucheteux
Cinematography
Eric Gautier
Editing
Laurence Briaud
Music
Grégoire Hetzel
Production design
Dan Bevan

Current

A Christmas Tale: The Inescapable Family
A Christmas Tale: The Inescapable Family
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By Phillip Lopate

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Performances

Outlier Looking In: Emmanuelle Devos in A Christmas Tale

Amid the tumultuous family dynamics on display in Arnaud Desplechin’s A Christmas Tale, Emmanuelle Devos delivers a performance of remarkable subtlety and lyricism.

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The French filmmaker discussed revisiting the world of his breakthrough feature, his desire to communicate with a younger generation, and his signature cinematic flourishes.

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Explore

Catherine Deneuve

Actor

Catherine Deneuve
Catherine Deneuve

One of cinema’s great beauties, Catherine Deneuve (born Catherine Dorléac in Paris in 1943) is also an icon of the transformative cinematic 1960s. The daughter of two actors and the sister of three (one of whom, Françoise Dorléac, died in a car crash in 1967), Deneuve has acting in her blood. After her major breakthrough in Jacques Demy’s poignant 1964 musical The Umbrellas of Cherbourg, Deneuve continued to prove she was more than just a pretty face in Roman Polanski’s thriller Repulsion and Luis Buñuel’s surreal erotic daydream Belle de jour. Those films may exploit Deneuve’s crystalline loveliness for its seeming inscrutability, but her portrayals of sexual repression in both (and her shocking embodiment of schizophrenia in the former) make for two of the most vivid performances of the era. Those roles set her on the path to becoming a full-fledged movie star, and she went on to act for François Truffaut, Alain Cavalier, Marco Ferreri, and Jean-Pierre Melville. Her performances have grown richer as she’s aged; today, she is a true grand dame of the cinema, and her compellingly enigmatic looks—once interpreted as fragile—have taken on a mature imperiousness, as evidenced in such films as Arnaud Desplechin’s A Christmas Tale (in which she costars with her daughter with Marcello Mastroianni, Chiara Mastroianni).