Chris & Don: A Love Story (2007)

92% of critics liked it
(37 reviews)
82% of users liked it
(381 ratings)

Guido Santi and Tina Mascara's documentary Chris and Don. A Love Story traces the romantic relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood and painter Don Bachardy. The filmmakers utilize interviews with Don himself, as well as personal documents belonging to Isherwood, in order to show how the… More Guido Santi and Tina Mascara's documentary Chris and Don. A Love Story traces the romantic relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood and painter Don Bachardy. The filmmakers utilize interviews with Don himself, as well as personal documents belonging to Isherwood, in order to show how the duo nurtured each other's artistic instincts while establishing a deep emotional bond that survived even after Isherwood's passing. ~ Perry Seibert, Rovi

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Rating, Runtime: Unrated, 1 hr. 30 min.
Directed By: Tina Mascara, Guido Santi
Genres: Documentary, Musical & Performing Arts, Gay & Lesbian, Special Interest

In Theaters: Aug 31, 2007 Wide
On DVD: Feb 24, 2009
Studio: Zeitgeist Films

Critic Reviews

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader
Surprisingly, this 2007 documentary about their 34-year relationship becomes more engrossing as its focus shifts from Isherwood to Bachardy...
Sid Smith, Chicago Tribune
There's a bit of Pygmalion meets The Portrait of Dorian Gray to it, and yet part of the documentary's slyness involves probing those aspects while never losing sight of the pain and glories of any emotional relationship that lasts as long as
Ann Hornaday, Washington Post
With delectable-looking home movies of the couple's travels in California and Europe, Chris and Don offers an intimate portrayal of a passionate, enduring association, as well as a social history of postwar life.
David Wiegand, San Francisco Chronicle
Santi and Mascara are right to call their film A Love Story, because this is the portrait of a marriage as full and enviable as the greatest unions in literature.
Stanley Kauffmann, New Republic
The subtitle of the film is 'A Love Story.' The picture makes the worn term fresh, moving.
Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
The work is a reflective hodgepodge of unnervingly 'cute' animation, reenactments, archival footage, and Bachardy's own reminiscences, spoken in the singular British accent he invented just as he invented his own unorthodox life.
Don Willmott, Filmcritic.com
A wonderfully crafted documentary about a most unusual long-term relationship
Fr. Chris Carpenter, Orange County and Long Beach Blade
A great, revealing documentary; one of the best films released in 2008
Sal Cinquemani, Slant Magazine
A colorful portrait of an enduring marriage gets the star treatment on DVD.
Dan Callahan, Slant Magazine
There are many reasons to see Chris & Don, but the best one I can think of is the chance to see Isherwood and his best friend W.H. Auden, probably the greatest poet of the twentieth century, jumping around together like middle-aged schoolboys in beguiling
Kimberley Jones, Austin Chronicle
The documentary, made after Isherwood's death and with Bachardy's enthusiastic participation, is as much a love story as a chronicle of Bachardy's maturation into a man and an artist.
Sarah Boslaugh, Playback:stl
Long before anyone was talking about gay marriage, that's what Christopher Isherwood and Don Bachardy had
Paula Nechak, Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Isherwood was the far more interesting subject, but Chris & Don is all about Bachardy -- an observation that feels like opportunism more than love story.
Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times
Despite an age difference of 30 years, their connection was immediately electric; their first kiss, the story goes, broke a window.
Brian Orndorf, BrianOrndorf.com
It's a sentimental and loving picture, playing out as a leisurely cocktail-hour stroll through an enchanting life.
Richard Knight, Windy City Times
A charming, loving portrait electrified by the inclusion of lots of terrific home movie footage. These relics of gay history are worth the rest of the movie.
Tricia Olszewski, Let's Not Listen
Regardless of whether you recognize the names of Christopher Isherwood or Don Bachardy, this masterful documentary draws you into the men's lives like a star-studded bedtime tale.
Tim Cogshell, Boxoffice Magazine
It's an extraordinary film that gay audiences will find particularly salient, no doubt, yet audiences with an affinity for the writings of Isherwood or nostalgia for the golden age of Hollywood may find it intriguing as well.
Ernest Hardy, L.A. Weekly
A charming, illuminating portrait of the complex and storied queer romance between Isherwood and Bachardy.

Read all 19 critic reviews

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Featured Audience Ratings

Walter M

[font=Century Gothic]"Chris & Don: A Love Story" is a touching documentary about the decades-long relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood(1904-1986) and Don Bachardy who met in 1952 when Bachardy was only 18 and stayed together until Isherwood's death.… More
[font=Century Gothic]"Chris & Don: A Love Story" is a touching documentary about the decades-long relationship between writer Christopher Isherwood(1904-1986) and Don Bachardy who met in 1952 when Bachardy was only 18 and stayed together until Isherwood's death. While not always monogamous, they were more importantly open in showing their love for each other. Even while Bachardy imitated his lover's accent or mannerisms, he developed a career on his own as a portrait painter of the famous, most of whom Isherwood had introduced him to.(Bachardy grew up as a starstruck child in southern California.) As with any relationship such as this with a large age difference, I think it is only natural for there to be a large degree of cultivation, expressed in an introduction to a previously unknown world and ideas.[/font] [font=Century Gothic][/font] [font=Century Gothic]Most of their story is told by Bachardy who keeps active with his painting but there are also interviews with experts and notables including Leslie Caron, John Boorman and Liza Minnelli.(Isherwood's most famous work was "The Berlin Stories" which was adapted into the movie "Cabaret." Not surprisingly, Michael York reads selections from his diaries.) There is also archival footage, recreations, animation, and most especially home movies which are incredible in not only capturing the two men together, but any number of celebrities they encountered, most notably in the behind the scenes footage of "The Rose Tattoo."[/font]
Alec B

More than anything its just a sweet story about two people terribly in love with each other. Without overstating it, the film shows that all people regardless or sex, class, race, or sexual orientation all go through the same things in relationships. I would have liked a more in depth… More
More than anything its just a sweet story about two people terribly in love with each other. Without overstating it, the film shows that all people regardless or sex, class, race, or sexual orientation all go through the same things in relationships. I would have liked a more in depth portrait of Isherwood, but still the film is adequate.
Sunil J

This was a very well-made documentary but I did feel a bit uncomfortable about Chris and Don's relationship - not so much the age difference itself but the fact that it began at 16 and 46.