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The Hedgehog

Play trailer Poster for The Hedgehog 2011 1h 40m Comedy Drama Play Trailer Watchlist
Watchlist Tomatometer Popcornmeter
88% Tomatometer 69 Reviews 83% Popcornmeter 5,000+ Ratings
While planning her suicide, a precocious 11-year-old (Garance Le Guillermic) befriends a new neighbor (Togo Igawa) and a prickly recluse (Josiane Balasko).

Critics Reviews

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Ignatiy Vishnevetsky Chicago Reader 02/06/2018
Lacking any depth of its own, this upper-middlebrow French drama resorts to the old trick of referencing acknowledged masters. Go to Full Review
Marc Savlov Austin Chronicle 10/07/2011
3/5
Le Guillermic is fine in this calm comedy of subverted exteriors and expectations, but it's the remarkably unpretentious -- earthy, even -- Balasko who anchors Achache's adaptation. Go to Full Review
Calvin Wilson St. Louis Post-Dispatch 10/07/2011
3.5/4
"The Hedgehog" sneaks up on you with its heartfelt storytelling and sophisticated wit. Go to Full Review
Mattie Lucas From the Front Row 08/06/2019
2.5/4
Walks a fine line between sentimentality and cynicism, and emerges as a lovely and modern fable. Go to Full Review
Kelly Jane Torrance Washington Examiner 01/08/2019
3/4
[Garance] Le Guillermic is irresistible, making a character that could come off as a haughty brat utterly delightful. Go to Full Review
Dennis Harvey SF360 03/30/2016
Nicely crafted, The Hedgehog seldom aims to be more than a pleasant low-key diversion-at which it succeeds-so it's jolting when the story pulls an abrupt late turn that casts everything in a more serious, ambitious light. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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David Lee K Oct 11 Le Hérisson is a quietly luminous film, a small story that dares to speak softly yet leaves an echo long after it ends. Mona Achache adapts Muriel Barbery’s "The Elegance of the Hedgehog" with remarkable restraint, crafting a meditation on beauty, loneliness, and the subtle grace of human connection. The performances are just perfect. Josiane Balasko’s Renée radiates a stoic tenderness, while Garance Le Guillermic’s Paloma captures the sharp, weary intelligence of youth, without ever tipping into too much precociousness. The film’s deliberate pacing possibly can test the more impatient viewers, and its philosophical musings sometimes can be a bit over the top, but its sincerity ultimately redeems this completely. In the end it's a work of rare emotional intelligence, one that finds poetry and beauty in the ordinary and humanity and acceptance in the unseen. A film not of great spectacle, but of quiet revelation. A must see, if you ask me. See more 04/05/2021 A nice movie of people who, although less socially gifted than the people they are surrounded by, are often more self-aware and unwilling to pretend, however, these people are majority and our main characters feel isolated as a result, so they find some comfort in each other's understanding of each other, making a point by showing how this connecting reaches no matter the superficial differences between them, such as age, social status or cultural upbringing, a film about love. See more 11/15/2020 Very Elegant and subtle! Very french in spirit! Empathic and intelligent. See more 09/10/2019 Gently builds, very nicely paced, never frantic. A potentially hideously precocious child is fantastically played without once becoming so. Quite probably a modern classic. See more 09/03/2016 A film of great charm and warmth, telling a tale slowly and gently, a big story on a very small stage. There is a biting social criticism behind the story, about the superficiality of rich people and their inability to see the dignity, indeed the lives, of those who are 'less' or different, but it is played deftly, by actors who do the job rather than say they are doing the job and direction which respects intelligence. Would=be child actors (and their parents) might learn much from the girl in this film, her vivacity, her projection of intelligence by being intelligent rather than just acting smart. There is also a cross cultural element. I will say no more, other than that if you are not warmed and made thoughtful; by it, I'll give you at best one star :-) See more 03/21/2016 Pleasant and warm and just a tiny bit eccentric. Filled with lovely little details that made me smile. Great music. Cinematography is lovely. The acting is wonderful. But that ending though... sigh... See more Read all reviews
The Hedgehog

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Movie Info

Synopsis While planning her suicide, a precocious 11-year-old (Garance Le Guillermic) befriends a new neighbor (Togo Igawa) and a prickly recluse (Josiane Balasko).
Director
Mona Achache
Producer
Anne-Dominique Toussaint
Screenwriter
Mona Achache
Distributor
Neoclassic Films
Production Co
Pathé, Les Films des Tournelles
Genre
Comedy, Drama
Original Language
Canadian French
Release Date (Theaters)
Aug 19, 2011, Limited
Release Date (Streaming)
Sep 10, 2015
Runtime
1h 40m