a_chinn This European science fiction story reminded me in many ways of Fassbinder's "World on a Wire," the starkness, the deliberate pacing, and the art house pretensions all within a clever sci-fi premise. However, Fassbinder made his film engaging, suspenseful and also thought provoking. This film, while thought provoking, is dreadfully dull. The story here has TV producer Harry Dead Stanton sending reporter Harvey Keitel (who has camera implants in his eyes with special x-ray properties) to interview a dying writer, Romy Schneider. The film does pose interesting questions about privacy and independence in a society where both are eroding. This topic is made all the more interesting and prescient today, in the age of Google Glass and social media. Unfortunately, the film moves as a leadened pace and is populated with uninvolving characters, despite three strong actors in the leads, along with Max Von Sydow in a supporting role. This film does have it's defenders, but I found it pretentious and dull, though it may be that I'm just not a fan of writer/director Bertrand Tavernier, whose only film I've ever liked was "Coup de torchon."

Rodrigo Amaro The world is so infatuating, troubled and desperate that the only way we can care about it is to run away from our troubles by seeing others in distress, dying or getting killed by the thousands each day on the news or in fictionalized accounts as we get ourselves fed in what is called "entertainment". In the world of "Deathwatch", the latest advance in satisfying bored beings (won't call them human since most of them here are mere walking robots) is to follow a reality TV show whose main star is a terminal patient who is about to die at any moment. A show like this would be considered an outrageous act, a new low yet all sides of the issue whether being regular viewers or righteous souls opposed to it, they all watch it. Why? Because its too hard to kill curiosity. You may wonder how this managed to be presented? Well, we have Roddy (Harvey Keitel), a volunteer on a new experience where he has a camera implanted on his brain which records everything he sees, his eyes are the intrepid lenses who follow the poor Katherine (Romy Schnieder) recently diagnosed with an incurable disease. The filming of someone's downfall reflects in the escalating viewers numbers who are in it, trapped in this program, just waiting for the final hour. They want to be there, they wanna be present in those moments thinking they won't let her die alone. She'll have the company of millions. George Orwell's "1984", Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World" and Ray Bradbury's "Fahrenheit 451" all worked in giving us frightening visions of a future that already was somewhat happening in the time these authors were living. We're followed everywhere, there's pleasure everywhere, books are depressive and if you go against your rules there's punishment ahead waiting for you. I was almost waiting for "Deathwatch" to be a little like those examples (this is based on David Compton's novel), but it missed an authoritarian government to force people to watch it. But there's conflict, not only between idealisms (very reduced) but the one fought by Katherine and her choices since she doesn't want to be involved at all in this ludicrous spectacle worked on her back on her disgrace. Here starts many of the films confusing issues. It throws that mass consumerism and media are evil forces but it never gives them a proper face: the audience who watches the reality show all look simple people, compelled by the woman's tragedy; the master behind the curtains (Harry Dean Stanton) seems too good despite his ways of getting what he wants, always hiding himself from anything until he realizes there's no other way than show up and face the problem. We're never able to see who is sponsoring it; and why it's so important to present such thing.I'm not sure if the problem lies in the original source or in the way such was translated to the screen. All I know is that as long as it kept feeding me with ideas, new paths of thinking the unthinkable or the less shown on other films it kept me captivated, fully immersed in its story. Then the second half came in, proving to be sadly Hollywoodian and simplistic and disengaging. Luckily, the movie didn't mirrored its characters in the sense of us watching something dying slowly in front of our eyes. The final result is an interesting piece about mortality and how powerless humans are in face of many obstacles (and this is all sides of the issue, when it comes to Roddy's own problems while filming this project). Bertrand Tavernier makes an artistic, different and beautiful film over a delicate and rarely touched upon theme with efficiency which is death and everything surround it.Here's a quite innovative sci-fi film, more human, down to earth and less imaginative and technical as those films tend to be, "Deathwatch" is a thoughtful experience with pleasant and powerful performances by Schneider, Keitel and Max von Sydow playing Katherine's first husband. Satisfying despite its problems. 8/10

ammacinn I love this film, and have seen it several times on video and even once at a repertory cinema in Vancouver. I'm in Japan at the moment, and just picked up an old Japanese video release of it here from a second-hand store. Here's a shock -- the version of the film available here has some significant DIFFERENCES from the North American in print. There are some minor scenes that were cut from the North American release -- Keitel announcing a commercial break and shining his shoes, which he tells Stanton are made of ostrich, is a scene I sure don't recall in the N. American version, or Romy Schneider telling Max von Sydow how she loves to see the moon come out during the day. But there's also a significant plot point that differs, too -- conveyed by a few brief scenes and lines that are NOT in the American version (WARNING: spoilers follow). (I mean, it HAS been years since the last time I saw it, so maybe I've just forgotten the film, but I really don't think so). KATHERINE IS NOT ACTUALLY DYING, in the movie; she has been deceived by the doctors and the TV crew. We think she really is sick all along, but in fact she is being tricked, with the plan of "rescuing her" later in the series. The doctors reveal this shortly after Keitel blinds himself -- they have a conversation that goes like, "Do you think he should have been told that she's not really dying?" It's the medicine she's been prescribed; IT is making her sick. When Stanton calls the Mortenhoe residence, and Mortenhoe tells Katherine that "they're on the way," von Sydow has lines about how "it's all a mistake, you're not really sick, it was all a stunt -- you just have to stop taking the medicine!" So when Stanton and the TV crew and such are racing to Mortenhoe's in the helicopters, they're coming, in part, to "rescue" Katherine; and her decision to take all the pills and commit suicide, to ruin them, plays VERY DIFFERENTLY in this context. Maybe it was felt North American audiences couldn't handle it?If any of you can confirm that I'm not nuts here, and that the film I've just described is quite DIFFERENT from the US version, PLEASE e-mail me. One easy way to test would be to check out the runtime on the video release back there -- the original one, from way back when, I think on Embassy. The runtime is NOT 128 minutes (the version I watched actually is).All told, the international cut is slower, meanders more, but is ultimately the superior version, carrying Katherine's defiance out more fully. I recommend it, if you can actually find it. If you're curious, no, it isn't in print here anymore.

Infofreak I had been wanting to watch Deathwatch for years mainly to see Keitel and Stanton on screen together in something other than The Last Temptation Of Christ. I never managed to find a copy so I was excited when it was shown here on tv a couple of weeks ago. This movie is superb! Intelligent script, beautiful direction and photography, and faultless acting from Romy Schneider and Harvey Keitel in particular. PLEASE try and see this haunting and increasingly more pertinent film, it will resonate with you for a long time.