Jasmin Dizdar's BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE is a lively, darkly comic vision of Bosnian refugees making a new life in London, and the Londoners whose lives they change. As in Paul Thomas Anderson's MAGNOLIA, there are several plotlines running simultaneously, and they link together in surprising ways. Dizdar and his actors present these characters so vividly that the story is always easy to follow. Danny Nussbaum (as Griffin, a soccer hooligan who, in surreal fashion, finds himself in a war zone) and Charlotte Coleman (as Portia, a young doctor smitten with her Bosnian patient) are standouts in a fine cast. The film is shot mostly in a handheld, verité style that heightens its immediacy. Dizdar's storyline skirts tragedy, as the Bosnian immigrants deal with problems that the Londoners, with their own troubles, can barely imagine. But the film retains the hopeful attitude of its immigrant characters, and even some of the bleakest moments in the film have a black comic edge. Dizdar's first feature is a hearty laugh in the face of despair. Its ambition and scope, its deft handling of difficult material, and its consistently comic and chaotic tone, attest to an impressive young talent.
Theatrical release: February 18, 2000
The film was shot on location in London and the northwest of England.
The film won the Prix Un Certain Regard at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival.
Dizdar studied at FAMU in Prague, Eastern Europe's top film school, where he wrote his thesis on director Milos Forman (AMADEUS).
Rosalind Ayres, who plays Nora Thornton, also played Elsa Lanchester in GODS & MONSTERS, and had a minor role in TITANIC.
The film that Chloe Higgins is seen watching on TV is the beloved British children's film, THE RAILWAY CHILDREN (1972).
BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE was named one of the 10 best films of 2000 by the Austin Chronicle and A.O. Scott of the New York Times.
Excerpt: "Thank you very much for your hostility."--Pero (Edin Dzandzanovic) seemingly mis-speaks upon being introduced to the Thornton family.
DVD Features:
Region 1
Keep Case
Single Side - Single Layer
Anamorphic Widescreen - 1.85
Letterbox - 1.85
Additional Release Material:
Trailers: Domestic & Foreign Trailers
IFC Featurette
Interactive Features:
Interactive Menus
Scene Access
Director of Photography
Barry Ackroyd: Director of Photography, THE LOST SON (1999)
Review 1:
"...Dizdar creates something fierce, funny and vividly moving..."
Source: Rolling Stone
p.81 03/16/2000
Review 2:
"...An ambitious and rewarding watch....A narrative with a deep grounding in emotional reality..."
Source: Total Film
p.96 10/01/1999
Review 3:
"...[Dizdar] directs with extraordinary exuberance and self-confidence, in a style that combines documentary realism with a playful, improvisatory sense of formal possibility..."
Source: New York Times
p.E12 02/18/2000
Review 4:
"...It is fairly lighthearted, under the circumstances; like CATCH-22, it enjoys the paradoxes that occur when you try to apply logic to war..."
Source: Chicago Sun-Times
p.26 03/03/2000
Review 5:
"...[Dizdar] has invested the vignettes with a rueful, knowing sense of humor..."
Source: Movieline's Hollywood Life
p.37 03/??/2000
Review 6:
"...A pervasive playfulness, a tone that situates BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE within a distinctly European tradition of surrealism, irreverence and anarchic political commentary..."
Source: Sight and Sound
p.42 09/??/1999
Review 7:
"...This is a movie that plunges in, bold and willing, embracing both horror and blessings with equal vigor and buoyant intelligence..." -- 4 out of 5 stars
Source: Box Office
p.56 02/01/2000
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