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Partisan
Trained to be an assassin alongside other children, an 11-year-old boy, Alexander, begins to question Gregori's overpowering influence on the children and their training to become assassins. Threatened by his increasing unwillingness to fall in line, Gregori's behavior turns erratic and adversarial toward the child he once considered a son. With the two set dangerously at odds and the commune's way of life disintegrating, the residents fear a violent resolution is at hand in this Sundance award-winning thriller.
8 June 1999, Tbilisi, Georgia
18 October 1954, Tbilisi, USSR
23 November 1966, Paris, France
December 12, 2016
Kleiman seems less interested in explaining the whys of his scenario than in observing his characters and their interactions -- a strategy that pays off thanks to excellent lead turns.
October 08, 2015
Jeremy Chabriel is arresting as the increasingly uneasy youngster, and director and co-writer Ariel Kleiman proves adept at both world-building and attention-focusing.
October 01, 2015
Newcomer Jeremy Chabriel commands as 11-year-old Alexander, a chosen son whose dawning sense of right and wrong challenges the social order. An auspicious beginning, for him and Kleiman.
May 15, 2016
The storytelling is possibly a little too wilfully obscure, but whenever the protagonists leave the commune's walled-in compound, the desolate urban landscape outside - shot in the former Soviet republic of Georgia - makes a powerful impression.
April 01, 2017
... a world of seductive, ungraspable danger that is as dark and wondrous as any bedtime fairytale.
January 06, 2016
A film trying so hard to upend expectations that it loses itself in the process.
October 04, 2015
It's hard to tell if director and co-writer Ariel Kleiman is being serious or sarcastic with a story this preposterous.
December 13, 2016
A big fat meh.
February 05, 2016
With his feature debut, young Australian filmmaker Ariel Kleiman tells a creepy story about a cult-like commune, anchored by a riveting performance from French actor Vincent Cassel.
October 01, 2015
Usually, partisans stand for something, but in this movie, which is stripped of a specific time frame and relevant geopolitical context, the term becomes hollow.
February 24, 2016
A patiently unfolding drama that displays the lengths one will go to provide shelter and community, and what happens if you step out of bounds.
October 02, 2015
A moody drama that employs a dystopian-type premise that is not too far afield from a typical young-adult book series although with loftier aspirations and a less propulsive pace.
