Baltimore Sun by Chris Kaltenbach
A working-class drama that has its heart in the right place but undercuts itself by stacking the deck, letting its main character off too lightly and being overly impressed with its own profundity.
✭ ✭ ✭ ✭ Read critic reviews
France, United Kingdom · 1999
1h 40m
Director Laurent Cantet
Starring Jalil Lespert, Jean-Claude Vallod, Didier Emile-Woldemard, Chantal Barré
Genre Drama
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Set in Limoges, the movie tells the story of "good son" Franck (Jalil Lespert), who returns to his hometown to do a managerial internship in the Human Resources department of the factory where his father has worked on the factory floor for years.
Baltimore Sun by Chris Kaltenbach
A working-class drama that has its heart in the right place but undercuts itself by stacking the deck, letting its main character off too lightly and being overly impressed with its own profundity.
Terrific French film about that most universal of subjects - work.
Chicago Tribune by John Petrakis
Works so well for the first 40 minutes or so, that when the bottom falls out of it, I felt more than disappointed. I felt betrayed.
Chicago Reader by Jonathan Rosenbaum
This sharp, convincing, and utterly contemporary political film calls to mind some of Ken Loach's work, full of passion as well as precision.
Dallas Observer by Luke Y. Thompson
Part of the problem may be the use of non-actors in most of the roles. They look like real people, and they are entirely believable, but none has any kind of star charisma.
Austin Chronicle by Marc Savlov
Human Resources, which gets my vote for most sarcastic title of the year, isn't a stand up and cheer kind of film.
San Francisco Chronicle by Mick LaSalle
A rare film about the class and educational divide that can happen even within families.
Chicago Sun-Times by Roger Ebert
A valuable, heartbreaking film about the way those resources are plugged into a system, drained of their usefulness and discarded.
Human Resources resonates because it restores the humanity to that dehumanizing title phrase.
San Francisco Examiner by Wesley Morris
At its best when it's hovering around the muted dysfunction between a father and a son, who never understood each other to begin with.
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