Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #80106 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-04-09
• Rating: NR (Not Rated)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Color, DVD, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 86 minutes

Amazon.com
Surviving Desire is actually three short films, two of which--"Theory of Achievement" and "Ambition"--demonstrate writer-director Hal Hartley at his most quirky and abstract. They consist mostly of a series of dialogues, presented out of context, about things like Brooklyn real estate, nonlinear art, and contrasting male and female approaches to suicide. Fans of Hartley will enjoy them; newcomers will probably find them baffling. The third film, however--"Surviving Desire," from which the collection takes its title--is one of the most charming pieces Hartley has made. This hour-long story follows Jude (Martin Donovan), a college teacher obsessed with a single paragraph from The Brothers Karamazov, who's fallen in love with Sofie (Mary Ward), one of his students who's writing a short story about him. As the romance plays itself out, philosophical conversations turn into metaphysical Abbott and Costello routines, Jude breaks into spontaneous dance, a rock band in the street serenades a woman in her apartment window--and gradually a rueful and whimsical sense of life and love rises out of Hartley's erratic rhythms. Hartley is an idiosyncratic filmmaker who's not to everyone's taste; this short film is probably an ideal introduction to his work. Some of his movies seem to be working too hard for a sense of poetry and end up feeling stilted, but in "Surviving Desire" all of Hartley's devices take flight. --Bret Fetzer

Customer Reviews

"I believe you are sincere & good at heart..."
This was the third Hartley film I saw & has remained my favourite. For me it holds all the quintessential characteristics of a Hartley film despite it not being feature length.Martin Donovan as usual gives a flawless performance as do the rest of the cast. Things to look out for......the bartender & the'dance routine'. GENIUS!

Love isn't a strong enough word
I first saw Surviving Desire when I was 15. It was on the local PBS and the whole world stopped. I called the TV station to see what it was that I has watched. When they told me, I immediately wanted to buy it. I searched for 6 years. No one new what I was talking about, much less who Michael Donovan was, and my searches always remained fruitless. Surviving Desire changed my views on movies as a whole. When I saw it, I realized there was no excuse for crappy movies. The relationships between characters was so intimate in a very sterile way. I suggest all persons interested in fine cinema, who have a love for indie films and can appreciate something non-mainstream NEED to see this movie!

iNfAtUaTiOn--such a lovely word...
i first saw "surviving desire" in ART SCHOOL--rented from an obscure video store, of course. i had seen "theory of achievement" & "ambition" on 'live from off center'--a PBS programme--and fell in love with hal hartley's smart, stylistic take on the essential: love, work, trouble, desire & conversation. weaving together disperate imagery & ideas, hartley's world explores the equation of sex & relationships: love is an act, faith is an ability. love without faith is merely infatuation. with brilliantly deadpan performances by martin donovan, mary b. ward, matt malloy, & rebecca nelson "surving desire" gives the intellectual viewer what they want: a tragedy WITHOUT a happy ending--something we can ALL relate to...