Pola X

Pola X (1999)

  • 75% of critics liked it
    (24 reviews)

  • 53% of users liked it
    (1,173 ratings)

Eight years after Les Amants du Pont Neuf (1991), which failed at the box office, Léos Carax returned with Pola X, a French/German/Swiss co-production with Catherine Deneuve and the young Guillaume Dépardieu in a story of love, incest, and descent into hell. Pierre (Dépardieu) lives with his mother… More

Play Trailer

Unrated,
Directed By
Written By
Herman Melville, Leos Carax, Lauren Sedofsky, Jean-Pol Fargeau
Genres
Art House & International, Drama
In Theaters
Sep 8, 2000 Limited
Winstar Cinema

Critic Reviews

  • Richard Brody, New Yorker

    Plays like a passionate, harrowing confession.

  • Joe Baltake, Sacramento Bee

    Audacious but not completely successful, Pola X transports Melville's story to contemporary France.

  • Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times

    It works on several levels of meaning and panache, yet it undoubtedly will leave behind those unable to go along with its unabashed headiness.

  • Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times

    Faithful readers will know I have an affection for raving lunatics and am grateful for films that break free of the dismal bonds of formula to cartwheel into overwrought passionate excess.

  • Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly

    The filmmaker may have written 10 drafts, but there's only one Carax, uncompromisingly ambiguous.

Read all 9 critic reviews

See more critic ratings and reviews on Rotten Tomatoes

Fresh (60% or more critics rated the movie positively)

Rotten (59% or fewer critics rated the movie positively)

Featured Audience Ratings

  • Elvira B


    <p>Pola X is based on <i>Pierre:, or the ambiguities</i> , written by Herman Melville in the 1850s, in a departure from what he is best known for (namely, Moby Dick). In my opinion, it is a story truly ahead of its time, a forerunner of so many introspective yet… More

  • Arash X


    A film about ambition & ambiguity made in an ambitious & ambiguous way,I guess

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