Product Details

• Released on: 2007-04-23
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Anamorphic, Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC, Import
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: Spanish, French
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 101 minutes

Amazon.ca Canadian Essential
It's been called "The Anti-Dances with Wolves." An epic, sprawling re-creation of the turbulence of the colonization of Quebec, Black Robe captures a moment when Canada was part of the "New World" still waiting to be explored and the clash of cultures about to be unleashed. Gorgeous cinematography enhances the stunning level of anthropological detail in this uncompromising film about a French Jesuit missionary assigned to Huron Indian country in 1634.

From Amazon.com
Forget about Kevin Costner's sun-kissed, water-colored, Oscar-winning Dances with Wolves. Black Robe, which was directed by Bruce Beresford, a director who gave the world the finest film of the early '80s Australian new wave, Breaker Morant, and who continually collides cultures and ethnicity in his films (Mister Johnson, Driving Miss Daisy), matches and surpasses the Costner epic as an expertly crafted, brutal saga of redemption and salvation. In 1634 a young French Jesuit missionary is assigned to trek 1,500 miles through the New France wilderness to a mission settled in Huron Indian country. Black Robe chronicles the journey of Father Laforgue (Lothaire Blutheau) as he leaves his Jesuit brothers and, with the aid of a young translator and guide, Daniel (Aden Young), and eight canoes of Algonquin Indians, moves into the uncompromising Canadian northern territory on a die-hard mission to convert the natives. Mixing elements of Michael Mann's The Last of the Mohicans and Roland Joffé's The Mission, Beresford offers a restless tale of Laforgue's conflicted faith juxtaposed against the sublime spiritual harmony with the land that the Huron and Algonquin already hold. Black Robe dances to its own drummer and is tuned into the precarious balance between nature's mystery and spirit and the strident, unyielding religious ethic. The cinematography by Peter James is relentlessly cruel and bleak, but it absolutely conveys the obstacles that face the idealistic and blind young priest, who by the end, has faced his own awakening. The film also features one of the late, great composer Georges Delerue's most noble scores. --Paula Nechak

Amazon.ca
C’est l’automne 1634, dans une forêt en bordure du fleuve Saint-Laurent. En échange de quelques menus objets, le gouverneur Champlain prie le chef de la tribu des Algonquins de bien vouloir accompagner le père Laforgue (Lothaire Bluteau) en pays huron. Ainsi débute Black Robe, du réalisateur australien Bruce Beresford (Tender Mercies, Driving Miss Daisy), sur une légèreté de ton et dans la magnificence d’un paysage qui masquent habilement les drames à venir. Car l’histoire montrera vite que le chef Chonina (émouvant August Schellenberg) eût mieux fait de ne pas accueillir l’homme en soutane noire (d’où le nom de Black Robe donné au prêtre) parmi les siens. Non seulement Laforgue causera-t-il la discorde au sein des Algonquins, mais la promesse de le mener à bon port en le protégeant des attaques ennemies coûtera cher à la tribu.

Basé sur un roman de l’auteur canadien Brian Moore (deux fois lauréat du prix du Gouverneur général pour The Luck of Ginger Coffey, en 1960, et The Great Victorian Collection, en 1975), Black Robe ne fait guère preuve de sympathie envers les missionnaires jésuites. Le père Laforgue, en effet, se désintéresse totalement des us et coutumes des Amérindiens, méprisant ces êtres qui se détournent de Dieu pour trouver dans la nature et les rêves la matière dictant leurs agissements. Et c’est justement ce que célèbre Black Robe   : la beauté d’une nature sans cesse troublée par l’implacable cruauté des hommes. --Julie Sergent