[go: up one dir, main page]

    Release calendarTop 250 moviesMost popular moviesBrowse movies by genreTop box officeShowtimes & ticketsMovie newsIndia movie spotlight
    What's on TV & streamingTop 250 TV showsMost popular TV showsBrowse TV shows by genreTV news
    What to watchLatest trailersIMDb OriginalsIMDb PicksIMDb SpotlightFamily entertainment guideIMDb Podcasts
    OscarsEmmysSan Diego Comic-ConSummer Watch GuideToronto Int'l Film FestivalIMDb Stars to WatchSTARmeter AwardsAwards CentralFestival CentralAll events
    Born todayMost popular celebsCelebrity news
    Help centerContributor zonePolls
For industry professionals
  • Language
  • Fully supported
  • English (United States)
    Partially supported
  • Français (Canada)
  • Français (France)
  • Deutsch (Deutschland)
  • हिंदी (भारत)
  • Italiano (Italia)
  • Português (Brasil)
  • Español (España)
  • Español (México)
Watchlist
Sign in
  • Fully supported
  • English (United States)
    Partially supported
  • Français (Canada)
  • Français (France)
  • Deutsch (Deutschland)
  • हिंदी (भारत)
  • Italiano (Italia)
  • Português (Brasil)
  • Español (España)
  • Español (México)
Use app
  • Cast & crew
  • User reviews
  • FAQ
IMDbPro

De plein fouet

Original title: Head On
  • 1998
  • Unrated
  • 1h 44m
IMDb RATING
6.5/10
4.7K
YOUR RATING
Alex Dimitriades in De plein fouet (1998)
DramaRomance

A 19 year old Greek Australian youth struggles with his sexual identity and has one clumsy heterosexual and several homosexual encounters.A 19 year old Greek Australian youth struggles with his sexual identity and has one clumsy heterosexual and several homosexual encounters.A 19 year old Greek Australian youth struggles with his sexual identity and has one clumsy heterosexual and several homosexual encounters.

  • Director
    • Ana Kokkinos
  • Writers
    • Andrew Bovell
    • Ana Kokkinos
    • Mira Robertson
  • Stars
    • Alex Dimitriades
    • Elle Mandalis
    • Damien Fotiou
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • IMDb RATING
    6.5/10
    4.7K
    YOUR RATING
    • Director
      • Ana Kokkinos
    • Writers
      • Andrew Bovell
      • Ana Kokkinos
      • Mira Robertson
    • Stars
      • Alex Dimitriades
      • Elle Mandalis
      • Damien Fotiou
    • 61User reviews
    • 7Critic reviews
  • See production info at IMDbPro
  • See production info at IMDbPro
    • Awards
      • 9 wins & 16 nominations total

    Videos1

    Trailer
    Trailer 2:10
    Trailer

    Photos19

    View Poster
    View Poster
    View Poster
    View Poster
    View Poster
    View Poster
    + 13
    View Poster

    Top cast48

    Edit
    Alex Dimitriades
    Alex Dimitriades
    • Ari
    Elle Mandalis
    Elle Mandalis
    • Betty
    • (as Elena Mandalis)
    Damien Fotiou
    Damien Fotiou
    • Joe
    Alex Papps
    Alex Papps
    • Peter
    Andrea Mandalis
    • Alex
    Dora Kaskanis
    • Dina
    Tony Nikolakopoulos
    Tony Nikolakopoulos
    • Dimitri
    Chris Kaglaros
    • Groom
    • (as Chris Kagiaros)
    Ourania Sideropoulos
    • Bride
    Eugenia Fragos
    Eugenia Fragos
    • Sophia
    María Mercedes
    María Mercedes
    • Tasia
    Anthony Lyritzis
    • Boy in Car
    Ana Gonzalez
    • Woman Sweeping
    Maya Stange
    Maya Stange
    • Janet
    Julian Garner
    Julian Garner
    • Sean
    Aimee Robertson
    • Nose Ring Girl
    Nathan Farinella
    • Young Ari
    Paul Farinella
    • Young Peter
    • Director
      • Ana Kokkinos
    • Writers
      • Andrew Bovell
      • Ana Kokkinos
      • Mira Robertson
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

    User reviews61

    6.54.7K
    1
    2
    3
    4
    5
    6
    7
    8
    9
    10

    Featured reviews

    6moonspinner55

    "That's what's wrong with this country...everyone hates everyone."

    Culture clash in modern-day Australia, as a 19-year-old Greek named Ari, handsome but feckless--and prone to snorting and shooting drugs--rebels against his hot-tempered papa, a man of values and culture but perhaps stuck in the past. Ari's inner-anger is all-encompassing; he lashes out at his family, at his diverse neighborhood (which appears to be an otherwise peaceful agglomeration of working-class Asians and middle easterners) and at girls who find him attractive. Ari's father is shown as disappointed with his wife and children, but even in the flashbacks there aren't any clues as to what would've made this man happy (he and his wife protested for Greek rights, but does he want his son to continue this fight--and what would the fight be about, the same issues the father fought for?). As Ari, Alex Dimitriades struts and preens like the next John Travolta (in fact, some of the home front squabbles, particularly one around the table, seem lifted from "Saturday Night Fever"). It's a risky role for the actor, who must keep up a perpetually ill-mannered demeanor, complete with lusty, angry homosexual activities which Ari keeps secret (his father hates 'poofters'); yet, Dimitriades, self-enamored and intense, makes the part work for himself and the audience. He's helped a great deal by director Ana Kokkinos, who also co-adapted the screenplay from Christos Tsiolkas's novel "Loaded" with Andrew Bovell and Mira Robertson. Kokkinos keeps the camera busy and free-flowing, although she stumbles when attempting artiness, which in this case is akin to dreariness. Some marvelous moments emerge in what could have been just another coming-of-age melodrama. **1/2 from ****
    9JohnM-9

    A study in brutalisation

    I've just come back from the cinema, and having read the book ('Loaded' by Christos Tsiolkas) and being British/Greek and gay I thought it was excellent. It is a rarity for a start: a very good adaptation of a book, with amazing performances from an all-Greek Australian cast, including the gorgeous Alex Dimitriades himself who, incidentally is straight. I was particularly impressed about the cinematography (I looked it up later - by Jaems Grant and no, it's not a spelling mistake), all moody and dark like the plot.

    The whole point about the film is encapsulated in the scene where Ari is having oral sex with Sean. He was selfishly roughing up and gagging Sean who had just said that he loved him. It was the ultimate brutalisation of sex by a brutalised closeted youngster in a hopeless, brutalising society. At that moment we wince, as Ari consciously rejects love for the anonymity of the street corner suck-off, but we *do* understand why he is unable to form a relationship: in his own way, he acts according to type, obeying his family's and society's homophobic and racist insults and conventions. Symbolically he looks up from his knees in the end, just as his TV friend Toula pushed him a few scenes before dismissively. The moral of the film as she says is that if you don't stand up for yourself you spend your life on your knees.

    That moral may perhaps be irrelevant or far gone for gays who have come out and have asserted themselves in society by rejecting the hypocrisy of a double life full of compromises, but it is nevertheless still relevant for a large number of people in many different cultures.
    Kirpianuscus

    not comfortable

    ...but useful for understand the perception about reality of a young man who use his sexual orientation, the nihilism and the friends as instruments to explore it. a film about frustration. and about freedom. and one of the most impressive roles of Alex Dimitriadis who mix the bitter humor, fury and fear to create a character who gives new perspectives about every day challenges. one of films who use a sensitive subject as way to wake up. and the gray tone becomes a tool for describe long slices of disillusion, fights and need of sense of life. maybe not great. but sensitive trip in heart of forbidden subjects. more actual today than in 1998.
    9rsmolin

    Superb Sleeper from Down Under

    Wow! What a powerful film! I have seen it twice and am amazed at the grip it holds on the viewer. The cast performs brilliantly. The themes are difficult and honest--our hero (who really is an anti-hero) recognizes his faults but cannot overcome them. No comic book, Hollywood film this! It is brutally honest with all its characters and so rich in acting and Greek music that I must say it ranks as one of the finest films I have seen in the past 10 years. Yes, the ending is sad, tragic, but real. Four stars for this excellent effort.
    Mattydee74

    A brilliant film about loss of hope in the jaded 90s.

    Head On is an amazing film. Its beauty and treasures lie in not judging the journey taken in the film but opening up to the experiences of a young man lost and hidden. Its not a bright, gay film but rather a fiery drama which doesn't offer answers but depicts a painful truth which many would prefer to disregard. This is a film about the loss of hope in the jaded nineties.

    It is very much a local film (shot in Melbourne) and an Australian film, but I think it offers up wider and more general issues.

    Few films capture the mood of the 1990s quite like Head On. It is a film embedded with characterisitics which intuitively identify the strangely blank decade that edged up to the 21st century. If the eighties was - though simplistically - regarded as the decade of high paced materialism. The 90s can be seen as a time of conservatism and cautiousness - again too simplistically - which could be regarded as the tired decade. A time imbued with a feeling that everything had already been done. Grunge embodied this, as did the increasing popularity of pastiche and remakes such as the way television shows were more and more the source for films. It was a time where even moreso than in previous decades - the answers and ideas were sort in ready-made forms. Reused, resurrected and exploited. Sarcasm and cynicism became law. Pettiness became more and more common. Many of us were just tired out.

    Ari, the central character in Head On played with brilliant vibrant vividness by Alex Dimitriades, is the embodiment of this tired feeling. He reacts to the world by going to extremes in an attempt to register some feeling, a momentary intensity. Since there is nothing new to be found, he embraces fleeting bursts of passion and uses anything that helps him escape the exhausted sensation whether through drugs or sex, people or music. Anything that he can do to keep himself isolated and inside his own individual mind, he races toward. Head On. He's gay but not proud. He's Greek-Australian but not interested. He's young but may as well be old. History is an excuse to crap on and foster negativity. Ari can't contemplate love because he's lost between the cracks of a society he doesn't care for and doesn't want to contribute to maintaining. He doesn't trust but he yearns, somewhere deeply, for some sense of security or truth. The film follows his search for reason in the chaos of his life in a world of silences and charades. But for Ari, there can be no reason. He feels doomed. Sensation is his only food, the only way to quench an indiscriminate, blind thirst.

    Dimitriades puts his body and soul into the role of Ari. Its the performance of commitment and intense passion for the role. He doesn't flinch at the frontal nudity or gay sex scenes as other actors might have and hence brings to the role an authenticity which is the spine of the film. But the supporting cast are equally well cast and powerful. Paul Capsis radiates every scene as Toula/Johnny, Ari's gender-bending cousin. Julian Garner is perfectly contrast as the one person who loves Ari enough to try and show him hope rather than dismissal. In fact, the script ensures even the smallest roles are provided with weight through the powerful and serious screenplay. The book from which this film was born - Loaded by Christos Tsiolka- is an excellent expansion of the films vision.

    The soundtrack is split between roaring alt-rock and techno-pop with some interesting surprises. The whole film comes together with a precision and ease which never feels unnatural or artificial. This is a raw but tight film. It deals with issues intelligently and strongly without judgement or fear. The loss of hope shown here is left to be dealt with in our own lives, and with the people we meet. I think the film provides a welcome opportunity to reflect on the destructiveness of notions like identity and truth in a world which increasingly blurs examples that aren't suitable or fashionable.

    More like this

    Comme un garçon
    7.5
    Comme un garçon
    The Sum of Us
    7.3
    The Sum of Us
    Hammam, le bain turc
    6.8
    Hammam, le bain turc
    Lilies - Les feluettes
    7.3
    Lilies - Les feluettes
    Drôle de Félix
    6.9
    Drôle de Félix
    Like It Is
    6.4
    Like It Is
    Tu n'aimeras point
    7.3
    Tu n'aimeras point
    C.R.A.Z.Y.
    7.8
    C.R.A.Z.Y.
    Head-On
    7.8
    Head-On
    Brotherhood
    7.0
    Brotherhood
    Looking for Alibrandi
    7.0
    Looking for Alibrandi
    Juste une question d'amour
    7.7
    Juste une question d'amour

    Related interests

    Mahershala Ali and Alex R. Hibbert in Moonlight (2016)
    Drama
    Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca (1942)
    Romance

    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Goofs
      In a sex scene between Aria and Dina, the actress' sweater is buttoned closed but her body double's sweater is fully open.
    • Quotes

      [last lines]

      Ari: I'm a whore, a dog, and a cunt. My father's insults make me strong. I accept them all. I'm sliding toward the sewer. I'm not struggling. I can smell the shit but I'm still breathing. I'm gonna live my life. I'm not gonna make a difference. I'm not gonna change a thing. No one's gonna remember me when I'm dead. I'm a sailor and a whore, and I will be until the end of the world.

    • Connections
      Featured in Head On: Premiere Footage (1998)
    • Soundtracks
      Opium Shuffle
      by Richard Maguire, Steve Hellier

      Performed by Death In Vegas

    Top picks

    Sign in to rate and Watchlist for personalized recommendations
    Sign in

    FAQ18

    • How long is Head On?Powered by Alexa

    Details

    Edit
    • Release date
      • August 13, 1998 (Australia)
    • Country of origin
      • Australia
    • Languages
      • English
      • Greek
    • Also known as
      • Head On
    • Filming locations
      • Melbourne, Victoria, Australia(on location and studio)
    • Production companies
      • Australian Film Finance Corporation (AFFC)
      • Great Scott Productions Pty. Ltd.
      • Film Victoria
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Box office

    Edit
    • Gross US & Canada
      • $379,384
    • Opening weekend US & Canada
      • $14,224
      • Aug 15, 1999
    • Gross worldwide
      • $708,398
    See detailed box office info on IMDbPro

    Tech specs

    Edit
    • Runtime
      • 1h 44m(104 min)
    • Color
      • Color
    • Sound mix
      • Dolby Digital
    • Aspect ratio
      • 1.85 : 1

    Contribute to this page

    Suggest an edit or add missing content
    • Learn more about contributing
    Edit page

    More to explore

    Recently viewed

    Please enable browser cookies to use this feature. Learn more.
    Get the IMDb App
    Sign in for more accessSign in for more access
    Follow IMDb on social
    Get the IMDb App
    For Android and iOS
    Get the IMDb App
    • Help
    • Site Index
    • IMDbPro
    • Box Office Mojo
    • License IMDb Data
    • Press Room
    • Advertising
    • Jobs
    • Conditions of Use
    • Privacy Policy
    • Your Ads Privacy Choices
    IMDb, an Amazon company

    © 1990-2025 by IMDb.com, Inc.