My Dinner with Andre is a passionate, volatile, and humorous encounter between two friends who have not seen each other for a long time, and decide to catch up on each others’ lives over dinner. Andre Gregory is an intense, highly experimental theater director and playwright in search of life’s meanings and spiritual revelations. His friend, Wally Shawn, is an actor and playwright living in New York who is more preoccupied with the search for his next meal. As Andre recounts his global journeys involving esoteric theatrical experiments and mystical adventures, Wally listens with more than skepticism, as his attitudes shift among wonder, puzzlement, admiration, and anger. What finally emerges is a sensitive portrait of a friendship that survives and transcends contrasting assumptions about love, death, art, and man’s continuing quest for self-fulfillment.
Louis Malle (born October 30, 1932, Thumeries, France—died November 23, 1995, Beverly Hills, California, U.S.) French motion-picture director whose eclectic films were noted for their emotional realism and stylistic simplicity.
Malle’s wealthy family resisted his early interest in film but allowed him to enter the Institute of Advanced Cinematographic Studies in Paris in 1950. After studying at the institute, he worked as an assistant to filmmaker Robert Bresson and codirected the documentary Le Monde du silence (1956; The Silent World) with underwater explorer Jacques-Yves Cousteau.
Malle’s first feature film, Ascenseur pour l’échafaud (1957; Frantic), was a psychological thriller. His second, Les Amants (1958; The Lovers), was a commercial success and established Malle and its star, Jeanne Moreau, in the film industry. The film’s lyrical love scenes, tracked with exquisite timing, exhibit Malle’s typically bold and uninhibited treatment of sensual themes. Social alienation… read more
I can't believe I never left a single comment here. Well what can I say? I was still 18 when I first watched this movie, and my life has been completely changed ever since. I never think the same way as I was before, I never lived my life the same way as I was before, and I've always been looking for a stimulating, engaging conversation with my friends since then (without much luck). My all time favorite.
Also: New essays up at the Chiseler; and there’s a new book out, Gary Cooper: Enduring Style.
Even if I hated the film (which I didn’t) I would love this film for the simple fact that it got made. I can’t imagine anyone pitching a movie like this to the studios today and if anyone does, props… read review