Till Human Voices Wake Us

2002
R
1h 41m

IMDb RATING

6.3/10

2.5K

YOUR RATING

Helena Bonham Carter and Guy Pearce in Till Human Voices Wake Us (2002)

Play trailer2:36

2 Videos

7 Photos

Drama Romance

A man returns to Victoria, Australia, where he grew up, and encounters a mysterious woman who reminds him of someone he once knew.A man returns to Victoria, Australia, where he grew up, and encounters a mysterious woman who reminds him of someone he once knew.A man returns to Victoria, Australia, where he grew up, and encounters a mysterious woman who reminds him of someone he once knew.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.3/10

2.5K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 2 nominations total

Videos2

Trailer 2:36

Till Human Voices Wake Us

Trailer 2:28

Till Human Voices Wake Us

Trailer 2:28

Till Human Voices Wake Us

Photos6

+ 3

User reviews49

6.32.5K

Featured reviews

9derekbradford

Amazing cinematography and lighting

As one who would like to make films some day, this film blew my mind as an example of superb cinematography and lighting, as well as balanced and subtle acting. Guy Pearce was a little rigid, but i haven't seen him in anything else, so that may have been an affectation of the morose and sombre character he was playing. Bonham Carter would be a dream to work with. She's a master of the art and has a sly dark, sexuality that i can't resist. I haven't yet, but i'll be searching out the cinematography and lighting credits and looking for more of the work of those fine technicians. Good work on a difficult and slow paced psychological drama.

9Heavy_Storm

Touches us...

I can't understand exactly why this movie seemed so good to me. It doesn't have a very elaborated plot. But the movie somehow speaks to us.

The way the director tell such a dense story is marvelous. Movies like this leaves us breathing deeply when it ends. You will fall in love for the characters, and pity them.

The movie suffers from a certain lack of complexity. In some minutes you can easily understand what's happening (and, if you read the box summary, then you will get it in no time at all). Still, it's pretty, and adorable.

The musical score is perfect. It draws us into the movie most of the time, and makes our hearth pounds together with the scenes.

Till Human Voices Wake Us is a poem. Simply as that.

snafu-4

A film like no other

i had no expectations before watching this movie. I've heard very little about it but what i have heard was it was just plain bad. I honestly just watched it because Guy Pearce was in it, but if there is one thing we've learnt from watching Pearce's films is that he takes the complex unoridinary films and this is no exception. Firstly lets start with the plot. From reading other reviews you already know Pearce is a doctor and his leading lady has amnesia, but the film is so much more then that. Pearce's character goes back to where he grew up to barry his father and goes on a journey to recover the past that he never dealt with. It's truley an amazing story about the tragedy one boy experiances in his youth and how it has affected his life thus. Don't take my word for it and don't listen to all of those who have said the movie was bad or made no sense, watch it for yourself and you will see this is another one of Pearce's masterpeices.

anita_baxter

Imaginative remake of Wild Strawberries

The supernatural seems to be real in this poetic film about a repressed Australian psychiatrist who revisits his boyhood home. Thereafter, the film becomes a long dream sequence as he deals with a terrible trauma from his youth. The beauty of the Australian countryside makes the dream world seem possible.

Ingmar Bergman's film Wild Strawberries has a very similar construction, without the ambiguity. Perhaps a direct influence?

The pace and music are deliberately slow to evoke a sleep-like world, so don't lose patience. Just enjoy the idyllic scenery and the wonderful acting, especially by the teenage actors.

HariElwingShaym

A dream taking over a life

I watched this movie on television while it was running several times one month. The first time I watched it, I got antsy and changed the channel back and forth. I wound up watching it in its entirety several times later on. It is a haunting, intriguing film. Guy Pearce, of course, is extraordinary and so is Helena BC. I see it as a portrayal of a tortured soul who is still in shock from a momentary incident which altered his existence forever. One moment he is an innocent boy and the next he is suppressing a nightmare he cannot come to terms with for half his adult life.

Once he allows himself to live the entire scenario with all the memories and the what if's, when he allows the ghost to be free, the tortured soul is also released. A beautiful, poetic and memorable film.

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
The title is taken from the last line of the 1917 poem 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' by T.S. Eliot. It reads: "Till human voices wake us and we drown".

Goofs
As Sam slowly reaches over and closes his dead father's eyes, we can see his father's shirt rising and falling with his breathing

Quotes
Silvy Lewis: If moths are attracted to the light, why don't they come out in the day?
Young Sam Franks: ...guess in the day, light comes to them.

Alternate versions
-Minor Spoilers* The film was dramatically reworked for the international version (ie. American release) due to pressure by its distributor who felt the stars needed to appear before their original appearance nearly 35 minutes into the film. Under supervision by the director Michael Petroni, the entire film structure has been altered using some unused footage (that doesn't otherwise appear in the original Australian cut) and trimming nearly 5 minutes of footage in order to introduce the adult Sam character (Guy Pearce) at the beginning of the film rather than a half and hour into it. Flashbacks are then implored from the original 35 minutes of the Australian cut for the Young Sam and Silvy scenes. Additionally, Dale Cornelius' original music score has almost entirely been replaced by an orchestral score written by Amotz Plessner. The results ultimately lead to two very different approached to the material with different tones. The original, director intended, version plays more like a romantic drama with a past/present connection whilst the international cut has been reworked to play more as a mystery with possible supernatural undertones.
End Spoilers *