Rating: 
Summary: What's it doing among great movies?
Review: Billy Elliot and Almost Famous deserve a nomination more than this movie. Pleasantville did a much better job of exploring a story of a town coming to its senses, pun intended. Chocolat is not as fluid and sensuous as its title subject. Too many little stories, too disjointed. Bad script. It could have been magical and more romantic. And it was the longest Lenten season ever to be seen on screen. What a waste of a nomination. One thing is sure, Miramax can sell anything to the Academy.
Rating: 
Summary: Simply Delicious!
Review: It is right that "Chocolat" reminds a lot of "Babette's Feast" (Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film). Both stories are about tradition and how everything can be changed by just experiencing new things (in both cases food prepared by a foreign woman). But, although traditional, "Chocolat" stills an original story. And "one taste is all it takes" to like this delicious motion picture.There are plenty of sweets to be delighted in "Chocolat": the story by itself, its original score and art direction, Judi Dench's performance; and the magnificent, and wonderful, and pretty Juliette Binoche, whose character, Vianne Rocher, is also part of a tradition and should be set free. And her chocolates....!!! But do not expect a comedy to surfeit of laughs, or a romance to surfeit of love, thought it is more like a drama, to find grace and reach satisfaction.
Rating: 
Summary: intriguing and romantic
Review: I loved this movie for it's outside sweetness and the feeling of warmth it left me with afterwards but also, the underlying moral of it. The movie is really about prejudice and the graceful weaving of the plot makes the story come alive. Although not exactly like the book the movie is similar enough, only adding one character and changing what happens to Lena Olin (Josephine Muscat), that the true meaning is not lost. The truthfulness of undeniable passions and the wall of prejudice the characters build for security make this a winner.
Rating:
Summary: It deserves an Oscar
Review: One of the best films I have seen in a long time. Binoche and Olin do a reversal of their roles in "The Unbearable Lightness of Being". Also a very seductive movie, ULB does not live up to the complexity of the book. In Chocolat, all the thespians dig deep only to find a tension that produces real beauty. Binoche is a strong willed traveller who takes here young daughter (who has real problems with all the moving) to a small rural town and meets Olin (who unlike her role as Sabina in ULB) is a weak character who is afraid to find true freedom - until she meets Binoche. As the catalyst to a series of town characters, Binoche is the sacrificial lamb to a town hell bent to maintaining the staus quo. The treatment of Gypsy question is dealt with with as much sensitivity as possible - but maybe this was not the time and place to give it too much complexity. Depp had to stretch a little bit more than usual here and the chemistry of the two is not really there - as if they were thrown together through some sense of convenience rather than real passion. The supporting cast of characters is second to none and it would be a shame to give the Oscar for best picture to any other movie. Despite my lack of complexity and treatment of this movie, I strongly feel that it had just about everything for everyone - but most of all a sense of true emancipation - an ethereal quality that you don't find too often - specially in world filled with songs about hate and movies valorizing Serial Killers. 5 x 5 stars and a movie that will last the test of time. Miguel Llora
Rating:
Summary: An Encounter with True Grace Just Waiting to be Found
Review: My husband and I saw this movie in a packed theater on a Sat. afternoon. I was skeptical whether my husband would think it a "chick flick," but alas, we both loved it! The movie is a beautiful passion that weaves its way through the village in need of grace rather than rules, and rules, and rules. The actors are extremely careful to make all of your senses understand each one's portrayal of the intensity of need so waiting to be encountered. That need being portrayed by the gteat actors as art--for the village and its people are emotionally painted as an impressionistic painting' therefore, they find grace. This is an "artsy movie," but it is a must, even when you didn't think you needed it!
Rating:
Summary: simply wonderful
Review: Saw this at a packed house on Wednsday night way before its wide release...the audience reaction showed that everyone in the theater enjoyed the film...everyone seemed to be so into it, all of us laughing together and crying together...it truly was a film where the whole audience participated in the magic...great performances all around, and beautiful scenery...this is definitely a feel good movie because I noticed that everyone was smiling afterward...a definite recommendation to all those who can appreciate a well-done and beautiful film without all the violence, sex, and gore...top notch...
Rating: 
Summary: OVER RATED!
Review: The first thing I would like to say is this is a "good" movie,not great not even the best you'll see this year just good.Ok so maybe I'm acting like Kenneth Turan saying I liked it but it dosent deserve even three stars at least but Miramax will have to balme themselves. This year Miramax ran the most tasteless oscar campaign since John Wayne did with The Alamo. Ok now for the film,its and ok movie.Good music,nice photograpy and Alfred Molina is great but thats about it.It didn't make me feel great or anything it was just a movie you go see and you soon forget it.I'm not saying don't go see it,but just because it was nominated for best picture dosent mean it deserves it,it stole that from Billy Elliot,Almost Famous,or Dancer in the Dark. I hear Weinstein actually feels embearessed for the Chocolat campaign,good he should be.
Rating:
Summary: A Sweet Fantasy
Review: A Fable for adults, this film could have been terrible if placed in the wrong hands. Thank goodness that Lasse Hallstrom directed it. He is abetted by a fantastic cast, possibly the best ensemble this year. Juliette Binoche is exquisite, an actress of subtle power and great beauty; she has quietly become one of the great icons in modern films( although most of her films are French. I feel sorry for those who don't like subtitles, you're missing out!) Don't be surprised if she manages to best Julia Roberts at the Oscars. Judi Dench , Lena Olin, and Alfred Molina are all very good. The little girl is played by Victoire Thisovol, who wowed the critics a few years back in Ponette(is she the next Binoche?) OK, Johnny Depp isn't exactly convincing as an Irish Gypsy, but he has great charisma, and he and Binoche have good chemistry. This movie is not really an important one, or nesessarily a great work of art, but it is an extemely entertaining film. Don't miss it.
Rating:
Summary: RICHLY SEDUCTIVE
Review: Juliette Binoche does not do much with which I can find fault. She is beautiful, talented, unconventional and luminous in this role of a wandering woman and her daughter who open a chocolate shop in a small, conservative French town just as Lent begins. Binoche slowly wins over the townspeople with her delicious concoctions, but the mayor (Alfred Molina) is unmoved, as is a severe women who works with him (Carrie Anne Moss, virtually unrecognisable from her role as Trinity in The Matrix). Binoche's daughter is charmingly portrayed by young actress Victoire Thivisol, who was first seen as a tiny child in the engaging and sad French film Ponette. Binoche's love interest is played by Johnny Depp, who is summarily shunned by the town. Other fascinating roles, the always superb Judi Dench as the woman who rents the shop to Binoche (and as Moss's estranged mother. Moss will not allow Dench to see her grandson, but Binoche conspires to allow grandmother and grandson to see one another secretly at her shop). Also important here are the roles of the abused wife, Lena Olin (real-life wife of director Lasse Hallstrom) and her husband, played well by Peter Stormare (whom you may remember best as the accomplice to the crime in Fargo. He was the blond one who stuffs Steve Buscemi's body into the wood chipper). Overall this is a beautiful film, and while it basically has a happy ending, it is still worthwhile and wonderful.
Rating:
Summary: Tantalizing
Review: "Chocolat" is one of the best films I've ever seen! Simple, yet deliciously subtle, it takes you on a voyage of discovery. Each character is dealing with issues, many of which I could relate to. There is humor and passion, but the overlying sensuality is seductive. This sensuality is not based on sexuality, but the use of all our senses to experience life. The images of chocolate being made and eaten symbolize the forbidden desires of the characters. To those of you afraid this is a "chick flick" - don't sell it short. The appeal of the movie isn't limited to women and both times I've seen it (so far), the men in the audience have reacted equally, if not more, than the women to the story and the images. Give "Chocolat" a chance to seduce you!
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