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Staring: Paul Muni, Gale Sondergaard, Joseph Schildkraut, Gloria Holden, Donald Crisp
Director: William Dieterle
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Product Details
Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
Brand: Warner Home Video
EAN: 9780790793078
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Full Screen, Subtitled, NTSC
ISBN: 0790793075
Label: Warner Home Video
Manufacturer: Warner Home Video
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: Warner Home Video
Region Code: 1
Release Date: 2005-02-01
Running Time: 116
Studio: Warner Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 1937-10-02

Product Features
The Life of Emile Zola episodically explores the career of the novelist who championed the cause of France's oppressed. Zola (Paul Muni) is a hugely successful French author who risks all his success and comfort to come to the defense of the unjustly jailed Capt. Dreyfus (Oscar winner Joseph Schildkraut). Winner of three Oscars overall - and of immense critical and popular success - his distinguis

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Editorial Review
Description
The Life of Emile Zola episodically explores the career of the novelist who championed the cause of France's oppressed. Zola (Paul Muni) is a hugely successful French author who risks all his success and comfort to come to the defense of the unjustly jailed Capt. Dreyfus (Oscar winner Joseph Schildkraut). Winner of three Oscars overall-and of immense critical and popular success-this distinguished film is a must-see portrait of a life that's "a moment of the conscience of man." Winner of the Academy Award for Best Picture, Best Screenplay and Best Supporting Actor. Year: 1937 Director: William Dieterle, Irving Rapper Starring: Paul Muni, Gale Sondergaard, Joseph Schildkraut, Gloria Holden, Donald Crisp, Erin O'Brien-Moore, Henry O'Neil, Morris Carnovsky, Louis Calhern.

Amazon.com
Still as potently relevant today as it was in 1937, The Life of Emile Zola is a marvelously entertaining slab of Hollywood social issue-mongering. The life of the French writer is broadly sketched in the early going, but the film settles into its groove with the Dreyfus affair: the scandalous railroading of a military captain for treason, which shook France to its foundation in the 1890s. The elderly Zola's gradual involvement in the case, climaxing with his electrifying "J'accuse!" essay and subsequent trial for libel, is the heart and soul of the picture.

Warner Bros.' version of this story, directed by William Dieterle, carries over the passion (and hokum) of the previous year's Story of Louis Pasteur. It also retains that film's leading man, Paul Muni, who turns in an elaborately theatrical performance. The result was a box-office smash and three Oscars, for best picture, script, and supporting actor (Joseph Schildkraut, who plays Dreyfus). While the film occasionally creaks with Hollywood artifice, the clarion call of truth and outrage come through surprisingly strongly--indeed the film looks prescient as a warning about governments closing ranks to cover up mistakes. Mostly sidestepped is the anti-Semitic vitriol of the campaign against Dreyfus (his Jewishness is referenced only in a written report glimpsed for a moment). This is an old-fashioned barnburner that encourages the viewer to fan the flames. --Robert Horton

Customer Reviews

"Truth is marching on and will not be stopped", 2007-06-11
I was amazed at the power of this "old" movie. Made in 1937, in black and white, obviously, and acted in the over-the-top style that was in vogue in those days (pre-Actors Studio). Yet, dated though some of the aspects of the film are, the message is timeless and certainly is apt for this moment. I won't retell the story, as others here have done a good job and many readers will already know the events on which the film is based. It's certainly worth seeing and pondering how the message applies to today. Zola said, in the end, "Truth is marching on and will not be stopped." Let's all drink to that!

Emile Zola DVD, 2010-01-11
DVD came wrapped in brand new condition. Happy I found this title on Amazon as it was a gift for a family member who collects Oscar Best Picture Winners.

the life of Emile Zola, 2009-11-24
This is a very old classic. It is for people that enjoy inspirational themes, and history. It was WB's first academy award winner, and it also won the film critics award. Because the modern films are so full of sensationalism, special effects, and lack of dialog, I think this film should be kept alive as an example of great works. It is a wittness as to what could be done with a hint of intelligence, and discretion.

Worlds collide!, 2009-09-01
William Dieterle ( who also directed the cult movie "The Devil and Daniel Webster" ) translated to the screen the life of this emblematic French writer, the great author of the Naturalism genre.

Along his life he portrayed and pictured like any other of his contemporaries, the dramatic and multiple social injustices of a society who still had not recovered from the several ethic injures of the bloody consequences of 1789.

The Dreyfus affair was for Zola, vehicle for him to demonstrate his social sensibility around this resonant event that shocked the whole civilized world by then and now.

The reckless boldness through which Dreyfus was accused in order to preserve the integrity and the status quo's high command's official institution about a visible case of internal espionage aroused a scandal that overcame all the imaginable boundaries. It was a true slap on the face of the legality corpus. The arduous defense assumed by Zola is the central nerve of this memorable film.

Paul Muni -one of my twenty greatest American actors ever- is overwhelming in this role as well as the rest of the cast. The excellent recreation of a shameful true life drama!

Vive la France!, 2009-10-27
If you don't know who Emile Zola is, you should! See this movie and learn! And Paul Muni never fails to deliver! A wonderful movie!

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