Manon of the Spring

Orion Classics | Release Date: December 4, 1987

CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION

70	METASCORE Generally favorable reviews based on 16 Critic Reviews

Positive:

Mixed:

Negative:

Critic Reviews

Critic score Publication By date

100

Roger Ebert

It moves with a majestic pacing over the affairs of four generations, demonstrating that the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children. Read full review

100

James Berardinelli

The twists taken by the narrative, the quality of the performances, the superlative cinematography, and Berri's masterful direction make this one of the best motion pictures ever to cross the Atlantic Ocean. Read full review

100

Tasha Robinson

The pacing is expansive rather than draggy; Berri is in no rush to tear through his story, but the dialogue is generally meaningful and story-critical, and very little goes on that isn't directly relevant to the story's ultimate ends. Read full review

100

Ted Mahar

Director Claude Berri plays the story out steadily, beautifully and thrillingly. [25 Dec 1987, p.F20]

Kevin Thomas

Manon of the Spring reminds us how gratifying good old-fashioned revenge can be. Yet the film makers also remind us that carrying vengeance too far is ultimately futile and self-destructive. [24 Dec 1987]

Bill Cosford

The whole four hours or so of the two films is as handsome a package as France has produced in years. [30 Dec 1987, p.D6]

EmpireGavin Bainbridge

Another aching heartbreaker of a film by Berri that absorbs and rewards the audience for sticking with Manon on her sun-beaten quest. Read full review

David Ansen

A rousing tale of retribution that ties up the dangling threads with bold melodramatic flourish. [09 Nov 1987, p.77]

Jake Cole

This tonal shift transforms Manon of the Spring from a caustic morality play into something more reflective, an elegy to a way of life whose residents did not fully appreciate until they themselves had helped to end it. Read full review

Nigel Floyd

In the final scenes, the film slides into a Hardyesque fatalism, with the loose ends tied up a little too neatly, resulting in an air of literary contrivance. It nevertheless succeeds, like the earlier film, in tapping the well-springs of one's emotions. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Manon des Sources is the poignant, but more dramatically wobbly, followup to Jean de Florette, producer-director Claude Berri's risky two-film adaptation of a novel by Marcel Pagnol, who, unsatisfied with his own next-to-last feature in 1952, expanded it as a two-part novel. Read full review

Rita Kempley

Though appealing in its wispy way, "Manon" is only a continental soap opera. Read full review

Desson Thomson

To completely sabotage the work, there is an insipid affair between Manon and a young teacher, Bernard (Hippolyte Girardot). Their juvenile romance blunts the epic effect that Berri obviously is trying to create. Read full review

Jonathan Rosenbaum

Berri remains a boring director, dotting every i and crossing every t with nothing much on his mind but platitude. Read full review

Dave Kehr

By imitating the gestures and outlines of a vanished cinema, Berri can only provide a cold simulation. The surface is smooth and refined; the insides aren't there. [23 Dec 1987, p.A]

Vincent Canby

The events in ''Manon of the Spring'' are no more wildly melodramatic than those in ''Jean de Florette'' but, without the indoctrination provided by ''Jean,'' the second film functions as a mean-spirited review of the first. Read full review