Louis Malle

Au revoir les enfants

Au revoir les enfants

Au revoir les enfants tells a heartbreaking story of friendship and devastating loss concerning two boys living in Nazi-occupied France. At a provincial Catholic boarding school, the precocious youths enjoy true camaraderie—until a secret is revealed. Based on events from writer-director Malle’s own childhood, the film is a subtle, precisely observed tale of courage, cowardice, and tragic awakening.

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Film Info

  • France
  • 1987
  • 105 minutes
  • Color
  • 1.66:1
  • French
  • Spine #330

BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer supervised by director of photography Renato Berta, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • Video interviews with Louis Malle biographer Pierre Billard and actress Candice Bergen, Malle's widow
  • Joseph: A Character Study, a profile of the provocative figure from Au revoir les enfants, created by filmmaker Guy Magen in 2005
  • The Immigrant, Charlie Chaplin's 1917 short comedy, featured in the film
  • Audio excerpts from a 1988 AFI interview with Malle
  • Original theatrical trailer and teaser
  • New English subtitle translation
  • PLUS: New essays by film critic Philip Kemp and historian Francis J. Murphy

New cover by Michael Boland

Purchase Options

Collector's Sets

Collector's Set

3 Films by Louis Malle

3 Films by Louis Malle

DVD Box Set

4 Discs

$55.96

Out Of Print

BLU-RAY SPECIAL EDITION FEATURES

  • New, restored high-definition digital transfer supervised by director of photography Renato Berta, with uncompressed monaural soundtrack
  • Video interviews with Louis Malle biographer Pierre Billard and actress Candice Bergen, Malle's widow
  • Joseph: A Character Study, a profile of the provocative figure from Au revoir les enfants, created by filmmaker Guy Magen in 2005
  • The Immigrant, Charlie Chaplin's 1917 short comedy, featured in the film
  • Audio excerpts from a 1988 AFI interview with Malle
  • Original theatrical trailer and teaser
  • New English subtitle translation
  • PLUS: New essays by film critic Philip Kemp and historian Francis J. Murphy

New cover by Michael Boland

Au revoir les enfants
Cast
Gaspard Manesse
Julien
Raphaël Fejtö
Bonnet
Francine Racette
Madame Quentin
Stanislas Carré de Malberg
François Quentin
Philippe Morier-Genoud
Père Jean
François Berléand
Père Michel
François Négret
Joseph
Peter Fitz
Muller
Credits
Director
Louis Malle
Screenplay
Louis Malle
Director of photography
Renato Berta
Editor
Emmanuelle Castro
Assistant editor
Marie-France Poulizac
Assistant director
Yann Gilbert
Production manager
Gérald Molto
Unit production manager
Jean-Yves Asselin
Casting
Jeanne Biras
Casting
Iris Carrière
Continuity
France La Chapelle
Costumes
Corrine Jorry
Hair and makeup
Susan Robertson
Sound
Jean-Claude Laureux
Sound mixer
Claude Villand
Foley artist
Daniel Couteau
Production design
Willy Holt
Production consultant
Christian Ferry

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Explore

Louis Malle

Writer, Director

Louis Malle
Louis Malle

Crime dramas, comedies, romances, tragedies, fantasies, documentaries, and, of course, coming-of-age stories­—director Louis Malle did it all. This most unpredictable and eclectic of filmmakers enriched cinema over a nearly forty-year career that took him from Jacques Cousteau’s watery depths (his first film was the Cousteau-codirected Oscar winner The Silent World) to the peripheries of the French New Wave (Zazie dans le métro, The Fire Within) to the vanguard of American moviemaking (My Dinner with André). Malle had an intellectually curious nature that led him to approach film from a variety of angles; he was as comfortable making minimalist works like the wordless Humain trop humain and the talky André as phantasmagorical ones like Black Moon. He is probably best known, though, for his deeply personal films about the terrors and confusions of childhood, such as Murmur of the Heart and Au revoir les enfants. Perhaps not as well-known is his parallel career as a master of the nonfiction form—one of his many documentary achievements was the seven-part Phantom India, which would be a stunning career centerpiece for anyone else; for this director, it was simply a fascinating side project. Malle died in 1995, shortly after directing his final film, the typically experimental Vanya on 42nd Street.

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