Bayview Entertainment has unearthed writer/director Carl Bessai’s Emile, starring Ian McKellan, and has tabbed Apr. 25 as the Blu-ray debut date.
Produced back in 2003, the film had its opening at the Toronto International Film Festival in September of that year and then proceeded to work the festival circuit for the balance of 2003 and throughout 2004 … finally getting a showcase (arthouse) theatrical break in February of 2005.
It was quickly moved to DVD by Monarch Video in April of 2005 and has been out of print since then.
Emile is Ian McKellan in performance mode; an actor with all of the skills (twice Oscar-nominated) showing how a simple storyline can be played out in the form of a three-act play. Emile is an arthouse film, make no mistake.
Here he plays the title character, a lonely academic who is about to receive a prestigious honorary degree and uses the moment to reflect back on his life … a path to a point that he is not altogether happy with.
His niece, Nadia (Deborah Kara Unger — Silent Hill: Revelation, Silent Hill, White Noise, The Game, etc.), offers lodging, and this presents an opportunity for Emile to reconnect — or, perhaps better stated, to make an effort to reconnect — with what family he has left. Flashbacks fill in the details.
As he retraces his past, he finds a connection forming with Nadia’s young daughter Maria (Theo Crane), who also doubles as a young Nadia in Emile’s flashback sequences.
Mark it down Carl Bessai’s Emile — complete with a splendid performance by the great Ian McKellan — returns to the home entertainment packaged media marketplace courtesy of Bayview Entertainment … and for the first on Blu-ray!
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