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In My Father's Den [2005] | ![In My Father's Den [2005]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/31W3FP45CAL._SL75_.jpg)
 enlarge | Director: Brad Mcgann
Actors: Matthew Macfadyen, Miranda Otto, Emily Barclay, Colin Moy, Jodie Rimmer
Studio: Optimum Home Entertainment
Category: DVD
List Price: £19.99
Buy New: £4.25
You Save: £15.74 (79%)
New (22) Used (4) from £4.10
Avg. Customer Rating:  19 reviews
Sales Rank: 6562
Format: Pal
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 120
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
EAN: 5060034572107
ASIN: B000AND8MO
Theatrical Release Date: November 30, 2006
Release Date: October 3, 2005
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: sealed posted in 1-2 days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 14 more reviews...
 When Does The First Train Leave? July 16, 2008
0 out of 1 found this review helpful
I am not so naive as to believe that all New Zealand is like this depressing place, though I myself have only spent one day off a ship in that country (Auckland) and that back in 1969. This town has people living in dreadful, tacky little bungalows in a kind of nightmarish one-horse-town surburbia.
The film has won many awards, which should have warned me off. Take the cinematography: yes, excellent in places, but what were the director or camera people doing cutting off the tops of people's heads etc? I saw no artistic point to that. And the sound quality of the dialogue is dreadful, especially at the beginning. Mumbletown.
As to the plot, which revolved around the sentimental journey home of a shocked war photographer and the disappearance of a teenage girl, it is OK but the working out of it was pretty poor. Acting OK on the whole, good in places and I liked the young blonde girl lol! But this film was not for me. I had been looking forward to it. It did not live up to my high expectations. Maybe worth seeing once. I shall be selling my copy.
 Haunting March 6, 2008
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
It took me three attempts to see this film. My first two DVDs were faulty and I only got half way through. I nearly didn't bother to try again but I am so glad I did, and that I watched it from the beginning again, because this film builds in a beautiful way. At first the story seems fairly simple: man who left home at 17 returns after his father's death, meets up with old girlfriend who has a daughter, Celia, born around 8 months after he left. Had I given up watching after the two faulty dvds I would just have assumed it turned into a father/daughter reunion but the film is so much more and so much deeper than that. As it goes on and all those involved are forced to confront the past, it becomes apparant that things are not as simple as they first seemed. When Celia disappears I really began to wonder who was responsible. This film doesn't have the ending I was hoping for but it's story has remained with me even some weeks later. I intend to purchase this film both for myself and others as I think it's a film that will haunt for a long time.
 Loved it November 10, 2007
4 out of 5 found this review helpful
Watch It, just look at the reviews it's getting. I watched this film without reading any reviews and when reading through most of them I can relate to them, stunning, simple, breathtaking and quite simply outstanding.....
wonderfull and tragic at the same time May 2, 2007
9 out of 11 found this review helpful
Occasionally, a film can come along that will genuinely surprise you and In My Fathers Den is just such a film. What starts of as a rather unpromising family drama blossoms into an absorbing and multi-layered examination of family ties and responsibility.
Based on the book by Maurice Gee (which I haven't read, so no comparisons to make, of which I am glad), and directed by Brad McGann, who also wrote the screenplay the film deals with the return to his New Zealand home of Paul Prior (a surprisingly quiet portrayal by Brit Matthew Macfadyen), a lonely war photographer who left home under initially mysterious circumstances some 17 years ago, and only returns now following the death of his father. Paul has made something of a name for himself as a war photographer, and needless to say his return causes something of a stir around this small town, including awakening long buried feelings of jealousy and betrayal in his brother Andrew (Colin Moy), and catching the eye of his former girlfriend and apparently love of his life Jackie (Jodie Rimmer).
However, it is when Paul visits his father's house and returns to the secret den his father built so many years ago and filled with books and music, that he encounters Celia (Emily Barclay), an intelligent young girl with a yearning for something more from life than a small town existence. Initially angry at her use of the den that he and his father considered their secret, Paul and Celia become friends after she inveigles her way into his life using the excuse of a fake assignment for the school newspaper on this local celebrity. Their relationship soon takes on a deeper meaning, and so when Celia disappears, the rumour mill begins to turn and suspicions fall on the outsider.
What lifts this film above being just another tried and tested family drama is the complex web of connections and intrigue that McGann runs through the film and uses to connect all the major characters. Although Paul is clearly a damaged individual, using alcohol and drugs to deal with his problems (which do not all stem from his career as a photo-journalist, as we eventually see), he is the closest thing to an innocent in this film, the other main characters having hidden secrets and agendas that are best served by Paul's rapid exit from the scene. And the other thing that makes this movie so absorbing is Emily Barclay as Celia, a performance as assured and natural as you are ever going to see. With a screen presence rather like Melanie Lynsky in Heavenly Creatures and Thora Birch in American Beauty, she gives an extremely convincing performance as the young girl whose fierce creativity is being smothered by her small town existence.
The truth will out, and eventually it does, in all its appalling glory, leading to a genuinely surprising and tragic ending, which when it does come does not serve as a convenient resolution, it is just simply an ending, and is all the more believable as a result.
Dark, haunting, beautiful April 2, 2007
11 out of 13 found this review helpful
I watched this movie about 2 years ago, too tired to fully appreciate it or understand the Kiwi accents. Now, after seeing it again, I'm just simply blown away by its slow, thoughtful pacing and brooding atmosphere. The performances are truely gripping. Matthew macFadyen, as the not so easy to like, emotionally scarred Paul completely pulled me in fro the moment he arrived on the train. The girl playing Celia was strikingly natural and strangely quirky. The scenes between the two echo a silent tenderness that was just amazing. The cinematography of the NZ landscape in different seasons is also beautifully intertwined with the non-chronological storytelling.
The only thing I was put off by was the fact that censorship decided to cut out a scene that I remembered to be very meaningful. It's a not so revealing sex/fetish scene when it comes to nudity, but all the more revealing when it comes to Paul's way to handle emotional closeness to another human being. I was very sorry to see that go.
4 stars out of 5 for this censorship, as well as the lack of any subtitles. My English is ok but the Kiwi accents were still frustratingly hard for me to catch at times.
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