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Eternity and a Day

Play trailer Poster for Eternity and a Day 1998 2h 14m Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
95% Tomatometer 22 Reviews 93% Popcornmeter 2,500+ Ratings
A dying writer (Bruno Ganz), trying to finish the works of a 19th-century poet, rescues a kidnapped child about to be sold.

Critics Reviews

View All (22) Critics Reviews
Jonathan Rosenbaum Chicago Reader I was moved and captivated throughout its 132 minutes. Nov 15, 2007 Full Review Geoff Andrew Time Out Its long, fluid takes escort us through space and time, to universal themes and broader topicalities, effortlessly fending off charges of hermetic aestheticism. Jan 26, 2006 Full Review John Mount Sight & Sound The quiet, hypnotic intensity of the cinematic journey one experiences in Eternity and a Day is a rare and lasting pleasure. Mar 5, 2002 Full Review Curtis Morgan Miami Herald This is not light stuff. But if Alexandre doesn't find the answer to [his] question, he does finally come to a reconciliation that ultimately makes Eternity and a Day a lesson more about living than dying. Rated: 3/4 Aug 17, 2021 Full Review Sandra Contreras TV Guide Thought poets were a dying species, did you? Rated: 3/4 Nov 15, 2007 Full Review Jeffrey M. Anderson Combustible Celluloid Precisely controlled and confidently poetic. Rated: 3.5/4 Oct 25, 2005 Full Review Read all reviews

Audience Reviews

View All (138) audience reviews
Dani G Profound, dense, philosophical. Angelopoulos & Ganz? Not surprised this kind of deep film resulted from that pairing. Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars 08/19/23 Full Review Audience Member People nowadays have been eating loads of belly-filling greasy junk food which is mostly spoon-fed by American streamlined production companies. People have lost the appreciation of how valuable beautifully crafted long takes are. How it navigates the collective space called society and the collective time called history, through an individual's subjective lens. An old man who fears the present lingers between his yesterday and tomorrow, his pain and desire, his secular attachment to his lost wife and his spiritual ambitions of his unfinished book. His introspection appears in his self talking to his dying mother in a care center. He questioned why he abandoned his native language and pursued a new one with his life, while the Albanian little boy constantly ran away from him, from the child traffickers, from his tragic homeland. When Alexsantro stoped sending the little boy back to his country and the little boy stoped run away from Alex, their intention of separating their path of life is gone. Alex shouted vulnerably in tears to the child "Stay with me!" the imagined line between secular and spiritual faded and two lonely islands float on the endless sea together side by side for one day, for eternity. Rated 5 out of 5 stars 02/11/23 Full Review dimitris s Greek cinema at its finest, pure art Rated 5 out of 5 stars 03/30/23 Full Review Audience Member I'm scared, Selim. The sea is too big. Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/25/23 Full Review Audience Member Final episode of a trilogy that got started at the beginning of the 90s, Angelopoulos asks himself the same questions that the writer Samuel Beckett once did: how to end? And he adds a new precision that will make an impact in the final answer: how to end one's life when there is only one day left to live? It is when our time is limited that we paradoxically make the most of it and we understand this by witnessing Alexandre's trip between the past, the present and the future in the last day of his life. Even though he metaphorically travels through his memories, his present will to take the boy to the border gives him the chance to make a last good action before his death. The photography, that goes from cold colours for scenes from the present to warm colors for the flashbacks, is dazzlingly full of sobriety. The words from the letters that give this poetical Odyssey its tempo are so wise that they fill us with wonder. And when we finally get the answer to the question "Tomorrow, how long does it last?", we realize that Alexandre is ready and he is no longer afraid to die. "Eternity and a day" is a magnificent legacy of this director who passed away too early but who left us several masterpieces and awards. Full review on our blog Los Indiscretos : https://losindiscretos.org/english/eternity-and-a-day-1998-theodoros-angelopoulos/ Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars 02/15/23 Full Review Audience Member Definitely not for everybody. But for those who care, this film provides a wonderful chance to think about death. The film contrasts two kinds of death: natural, prepared death that is defined by aging and medical conditions ("I have a cancer, and I have 3 more months to live"), and abrupt, unprepared death that is figured in the movie as the political death of illegal aliens. Showing the interaction between a dying, old poet and an illegal immigrant boy, the movie suggests that the second kind of death - the death that gets us by surprise and leaves us no time to prepare for a transition from life to death - is unworthy of human dignity. Rated 4 out of 5 stars 02/19/23 Full Review Read all reviews
Eternity and a Day

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Cast & Crew

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Movie Info

Synopsis A dying writer (Bruno Ganz), trying to finish the works of a 19th-century poet, rescues a kidnapped child about to be sold.
Director
Theodoros Angelopoulos
Producer
Theodoros Angelopoulos, Eric Heumann, Amedeo Pagani, Giorgio Silvagni
Screenwriter
Theodoros Angelopoulos, Tonino Guerra, Petros Markaris, Giorgio Silvagni
Production Co
Greek Film Center, Paradis Film, Instituto Luce [it], Theo Angelopoulos Films, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Classic, Le Studio Canal +, La Sept Cinema, Eurimages, Intermedia Productions
Genre
Drama
Original Language
Greek
Box Office (Gross USA)
$106.5K
Runtime
2h 14m
Sound Mix
Dolby SR
Aspect Ratio
Flat (1.37:1)