Danton

When Danton was released to mostly widespread acclaim in 1983, a number of French critics took issue with the historical inaccuracies regarding the ideological clash between the hearty, good-natured man-of-the-people Georges Danton (Gerard Depardieu) and cold-hearted revolutionary extremist Maximilien Robespierre (Wojciech Pszoniak), former cohorts who found themselves at opposite political extremes at the height of the French Revolution. Moreover, complained the contrarian critics, Polish director Andrzej Wajda was making deliberate parallels between la revolution and the Polish Solidarity movement that was being suppressed by the Polish government just as Wajda was seeking financing for this production (ultimately filmed in France at authentic locations). Of course, Wajda's political parallels were deliberate, but regardless of inaccuracies (with Wajda taking a rather idealized, pro-Danton stance), the depiction of Danton vs. Robespierre in the years 1793-94 remains powerful viewing, filled with fire and passion and brilliantly performed by a first-rate French and Polish cast. Lacking the budget to make a full-blown epic, Wajda focused on the battle of wills that defined Robespierre and his rival, which ends with Danton martyred on the guillotine and Robespierre tormented by his own inflexible ideology. Criterion's two-disc DVD release includes a superb Polish “making-of” documentary from 1983, new video interviews (with Wajda, screenwriter Jean-Claude Carrière, and Polish film critic Jerzy Plazewski), and an accompanying booklet. Highly recommended. (J. Shannon)