A Very Long Engagement
"A Very Long Engagement" film poster
Directed by	Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Produced by	Francis Boespflug Bill Gerber Jean-Louis Monthieux Fabienne Tsaï
Written by	Sébastien Japrisot (novel), Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Guillaume Laurant
Starring	Audrey Tautou, Gaspard Ulliel, Jodie Foster Marion Cotillard, Dominique Pinon, Chantal Neuwirth, André Dussolier, Ticky Holgado
Music by	Angelo Badalamenti
Cinematography	Bruno Delbonnel
Distributed by	Warner Independent Pictures
Release date(s)	October 27, 2004
Running time	133 min
Language	French

A Very Long Engagement (Un long dimanche de fiançailles) is a novel by Sebastien Japrisot, first published in 1993. It is a fictional tale about a young woman's desperate search for her fiancé who might have been killed on a World War I battlefield (the Somme). Jean-Pierre Jeunet directed a 2004 film of the same name based on the novel. Image File history File links Download high resolution version (500x742, 88 KB)A Very Long Engagement movie poster This is a copyrighted poster. ... Jean-Pierre Jeunet (born 3 September 1953) is a French film director. ... Sébastien Japrisot (July 4, 1931 – March 4, 2003) is a French author, screenwriter and film director, born in Marseille. ... Jean-Pierre Jeunet (born 3 September 1953) is a French film director. ... Audrey Tautou (IPA: ; born August 9, 1978) is a French film actress, best known to worldwide audiences as the title character in the award-winning French film Amélie (2001, Le Fabuleux Destin dAmélie Poulain) and as Sophie Neveu in The Da Vinci Code (2006). ... Gaspard Ulliel (born November 25, 1984) is a French actor and former male fashion model. ... Jodie Foster (born November 19, 1962) is a two-time Academy Award-winning American actress, director, and producer. ... Marion Cotillard is a French actress, born in Paris on 30 September 1975. ... Dominique Pinon (born Saumur, 4 March 1955) is a French actor whose most famous roles have been in the films of Jean-Pierre Jeunet. ... André Dussollier (born February 17, 1946) is a French actor. ... Ticky Holgado, pseudonym of Joseph Holgado, (June 24, 1944 - January 22, 2004) was a French actor. ... Angelo Badalamenti (born March 22, 1937) is a music composer, best known for his movie soundtrack work for surrealist movie director David Lynch. ... WIPs logo, which closely resembles half of the WB shield. ... October 27 is the 300th day of the year (301st in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 65 days remaining. ... 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... A minute is a unit of time equal to 1/60th of an hour and to 60 seconds. ... A novel (from French nouvelle Italian novella, new) is an extended, generally fictional narrative, typically in prose. ... Sébastien Japrisot (July 4, 1931 – March 4, 2003) is a French author, screenwriter and film director, born in Marseille. ... Fiction (from the Latin fingere, to form, create) is storytelling of imagined events and stands in contrast to non-fiction, which makes factual claims about reality. ... Combatants Allied Powers: Russian Empire France British Empire Italy United States Central Powers: Austria-Hungary German Empire Ottoman Empire Bulgaria Commanders Nicholas II Aleksei Brusilov Georges Clemenceau Joseph Joffre Ferdinand Foch Herbert Henry Asquith Douglas Haig John Jellicoe Victor Emmanuel III Luigi Cadorna Armando Diaz Woodrow Wilson John Pershing Franz... Combatants British Empire Australia Canada New Zealand Newfoundland South Africa United Kingdom France German Empire Commanders Douglas Haig Joseph Joffre Max von Gallwitz Fritz von Below Strength 13 British & 11 French divisions (initial) 51 British and 48 French divisions (final) 10. ... Jean-Pierre Jeunet (born 3 September 1953) is a French film director. ... 2004 (MMIV) was a leap year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar. ... Film is a term that encompasses individual motion pictures, the field of film as an art form, and the motion picture industry. ...

The film's tagline is "Never let go." A tagline is a variant of a branding slogan typically used in marketing materials and advertising. ...

Plot introduction

Five soldiers are convicted of self-mutilation in order to escape military service during World War I. They are condemned to face near certain death in the no man's land between the French and German trench lines. It appears that all of them were killed in a subsequent battle, but the fiancée of one of the soldiers refuses to give up hope, and begins to uncover clues as to what actually took place on the battlefield. The story is told both from the point of view of the fiancée in Paris and the French countryside - mostly Brittany - of the 1920s, and in flashback to the battlefield. Poilu is a warmly informal term for a French infantryman, meaning, literally, hairy one. ... 29th Infantry Battalion, 2nd Division, Canadian Corps. ... Trench warfare is a form of war in which both opposing armies have static lines of defense. ... City flag City coat of arms Motto: Fluctuat nec mergitur (Latin: Tossed by the waves, she does not sink) Paris Eiffel tower as seen from the esplanade du Trocadéro. ... Brittany has an expansive coastline Flag of Brittany (Gwenn-ha-du) Historical province of Brittany région of Bretagne, see Bretagne. ... The 1920s was a decade sometimes referred to as the Jazz Age or the Roaring Twenties, usually applied to America. ...

Cast

• Audrey Tautou - Mathilde
• Gaspard Ulliel - Manech Langonnet, Mathilde's fiancé
• Jean-Pierre Becker - Lieutenant Esperanza
• Dominique Bettenfeld - Ange Bassignano
• Clovis Cornillac - Benoît Notre-Dame
• Marion Cotillard - Tina Lombardi
• Jean-Pierre Darroussin - Corporal Benjamin Gordes, aka. Biscotte
• Julie Depardieu - Véronique Passavant
• Jean-Claude Dreyfus - Commandant Lavrouye
• André Dussollier - Pierre-Marie Rouvières
• Ticky Holgado - Germain Pire
• Tchéky Karyo - Captain Favourier
• Jérôme Kircher - Bastoche
• Denis Lavant - Six-Sous
• Chantal Neuwirth - Bénédicte, Mathilde's aunt
• Dominique Pinon - Sylvain, Mathilde's uncle
• Bouli Lanners - Corporal Chardolot
• Albert Dupontel - Célestin Poux
• Jodie Foster - Élodie Gordes

Audrey Tautou (IPA: ; born August 9, 1978) is a French film actress, best known to worldwide audiences as the title character in the award-winning French film Amélie (2001, Le Fabuleux Destin dAmélie Poulain) and as Sophie Neveu in The Da Vinci Code (2006). ... Gaspard Ulliel (born November 25, 1984) is a French actor and former male fashion model. ... Clovis Cornillac (Lyon, 16 August 1967 — ) is a French theater, television and cinema actor. ... Marion Cotillard is a French actress, born in Paris on 30 September 1975. ... Julie Marion Depardieu (born 18 June 1973) is a French actress who has appeared in a number of successful movies. ... Jean-Claude Dreyfus (February 18, 1946) is a French actor. ... André Dussollier (born February 17, 1946) is a French actor. ... Ticky Holgado, pseudonym of Joseph Holgado, (June 24, 1944 - January 22, 2004) was a French actor. ... Tchéky Karyo as Dmitri Mishkin in the James Bond film Goldeneye. ... Dominique Pinon (born Saumur, 4 March 1955) is a French actor whose most famous roles have been in the films of Jean-Pierre Jeunet. ... Philippe « Bouli Â» Lanners (born 20 May 1965 in Moresnet-Chapelle, in the Redeemed Cantons near Liège (Belgium), is a Belgian actor, author and film director. ... Albert Dupontel is a French actor, born on 11 January 1964. ... Jodie Foster (born November 19, 1962) is a two-time Academy Award-winning American actress, director, and producer. ...

Other crew

• Original music: Angelo Badalamenti

Angelo Badalamenti (born March 22, 1937) is a music composer, best known for his movie soundtrack work for surrealist movie director David Lynch. ...

Controversy

This article or section needs to be updated. Parts of this article or section have been identified as no longer being up to date. Please update the article to reflect recent events, and remove this template when finished.

The "nationality" of the film has been of some controversy. French films are subsidized by the government through the Centre National de la Cinématographie, and the filmmakers applied for a US$4.3 million grant. However, rival filmmakers complained that the film should not receive the subsidy because it is not a true French film, given most of the funding for its US$55 million cost came from Warner Bros. Image File history File links Current_event_marker. ... Image File history File links Nuvola_apps_important. ... In economics, a subsidy is generally a monetary grant given by a government to lower the price faced by producers or consumers of a good, generally because it is considered to be in the public interest. ... The WB Shield, used from 2001 to late 2003. ...

Awards and nominations

The film was nominated for two Oscars, but did not win one. It was not eligible for the Best Foreign-Language Film award. 77th Academy Awards Sunday, February 27, 2005 at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, California Hosts Preshow: Billy Bush, Jann Carl, Chris Connelly & Shaun Robinson Show: Chris Rock Crew Producer: Gilbert Cates Director: Louis J. Horvitz Duration 3 hours, 10 minutes The 77th Academy Awards, honoring the best in film for... The Academy Award (Oscar) for Best Foreign Language Film is a yearly US award for the best non-English film released in the period October - September in the country of origin. ...

• Academy Award for Best Art Direction
• Academy Award for Best Cinematography

The Academy Awards are the oldest awards ceremony for achievements in motion pictures. ... The Academy Award for Best Cinematography is awarded each year to a cinematographer for his work in one particular motion picture. ...

Notes

• The initials MMM are carved several times by Manech, the fiancé of the heroine Mathilde. They stand for "Manech aime Mathilde", "Manech loves Mathilde". This is a pun: in French the word "aime" ("loves") is pronounced very similarly as the letter M. In the English subtitles, the initials were preserved by substituting the wording "Manech's Marrying Mathilde".

• The Albatross aircraft featured was actually an American Stearman, as flying Albatrosses are no longer to be found.

• The English translation of the title creates a pun, possibly unintentionally. Engagement could refer either to the marriage of Manech and Mathilde or could refer to the military engagement.

Albatros-Flugzeugwerke was a German aircraft manufacturer that supplied the German airforces during World War I. The company was based in Johannisthal, Berlin, where it was founded in 1910. ... Boeing Stearman PT-17 Stearman Aircraft Corporation was an aircraft manufacturer established by Lloyd Stearman at Wichita, Kansas in 1927. ...

External links

• A Very Long Engagement at the Internet Movie Database
• Un long dimanche de fiançailles on Warner Bros. website (in French)
• Review of A Very Long Engagement