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List Price: $29.98 | | Label: Paramount Vantage
Salesrank: 48826
Released: October 16, 2007 |
| Our Price: $3.95 |
| Used Price: $1.04 |
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MPAA Rating: R (Restricted)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Based on Mariane Pearl's account of the terrifying and unforgettable story of her husband, Wall Street Journal reporter Danny Pearl's life and death.
Description of A Mighty Heart:
A Mighty Heart comes at the murder of journalist Daniel Pearl with a de-glamorized intensity: it's not a melodrama about Pearl's kidnapping and killing at the hands of Islamic terrorists, but a near-documentary about the process of trying to find him. Thus the center of the film is not Pearl (Dan Futterman) but his wife Mariane (Angelina Jolie), a cool customer who manages--almost--to maintain her calm throughout the weeks-long ordeal. Director Michael Winterbottom is less overtly political here than in his Road to Guantanamo, although the reactions of various authorities, from U.S. officials to local Pakistani cops, give the flavor of different attitudes and approaches. Jolie, playing the Dutch-Afro-Cuban Mariane Pearl, does nicely at playing her character's control (others marvel at her sangfroid), yet she remains recognizably human throughout. By no means a star turn, the movie leaves Mariane for long stretches, and other actors shine: Irfan Khan as a detective, Denis O'Hare as Daniel Pearl's Washington Post editor, and Will Patton as a stymied diplomat. As engrossing as the movie generally is, the point of emphasizing the police-procedural method is sometimes obscure. Oddly enough, by rejecting the usual string-pulling of conventional Hollywood drama, A Mighty Heart ends up without a strong point of view--as good as its pieces are. --Robert Horton
A Mighty Heart Reviews:
Hero, Heroic Love 
2009-11-08 - Daniel Pearl's story is truthfully told in this movie, but it is told through the eyes of the woman who shares Pearl's legend as a hero, his wife. I'm not a big fan of Angelina Jolie, but I consider her performance in "A Mighty Heart" the best she has delivered.
True, the movie was criticized for not having enough details about Daniel's suffering in captivity. It's even documented that Daniel's friend Asra Nomani criticized the movie saying :" Danny himself had been cut from his own story". However, we need to understand that the intent of movie is to show the heart break of a woman who lost the love of her life in a horrible way. The documentary about Pearl is a must see and this movie is not in any way a substitute for that documentary. The movie tells a story, from Marian Pearl's point of view, of heroic love and a lovely soul that were so cruelly and horribly destroyed.
Marian Pearl understood that the killers were not about religion, as Daniel's best friend was a Muslim (Asra Nomani). The book, as well as the movie, shows Marian's political/spiritual maturity and understanding of the big and nasty political game.
Another great performance by Angelina Jolie
2009-09-01 - Angelina Jolie, like her husband, Brad Pitt, are great at picking a wide cast of great and original movie roles to fill their career. In this film, Ms. Jolie plays Marianne Pearl, the wife of NY Times reporter Daniel Pearl. Both husband and wife were journalists, and were staying in Pakistan after the 9/11 attacks investigating Islamic fundamentalism. The movie follows the trials of Marianne as her husband is kidnapped, and eventually killed by Al Queda affiliated terrorists. The kidnapping happens early in the movie, and most of the film focuses on the investigation of the crime by Pakistani and American authorities, along with flashbacks of the Pearls' marriage. The movie is filmed in the style of a Michael Mann thriller, along the lines of Collateral or Miami Vice, with a feel of a documentary. The acting is top-notch, with Jolie being the biggest name in the movie. The film's setting is authentic, as the poverty, pollution, traffic, noise, dust and utter chaos of South Asia is brought to life as the vivid setting of this crime drama.
Sorry to say - I also found it boring. 
2009-05-01 - I agree with the comments that it's a boring film - no matter how important the subject. And any actress could have played the part that Jolie plays. She just looks sad most of the time. Moves slowly, with a sad look. That's about all the acting that was done on her part, I'd say, except for one emotional scene. (Several people write about her beauty. I don't see that, either. But that's my problem, I guess.) Important subject, but a bad film, I think. Rent it before you buy it, I'd say.
Finally Found It 
2009-01-13 - I bought this for a friend of mine for Christmas. She wanted to see it in the theatre and I don't think it ever showed at a theatre near us. If it did it was gone in the blink of an eye. We tried to find this in every store we could think of and could not. I finally did a search on the internet and found it here. The shipper was great. Got this package in days after payment.
Moving film: true to the spirit of Daniel Pearl
2009-01-07 - Yes, we know how it all ends but we do not know everything that happened between the kidnapping and his vicious execution. Winterbottom takes the material in A Mighty Heart and layers it so that the audience becomes invested in Mariane's passionate love for her husband and ultimately relates to her frantic search to find him. As Pearl, Angelina Jolie delves into every angle of her personality: her intensity, her strength, her immense heart and her fairness which is an extension of her journalism career and her worldly view of things.
A Mighty Heart is a remarkable love story and an intense drama.
