Marat/Sade

1967
Approved
1h 59m

IMDb RATING

7.5/10

2.7K

YOUR RATING

Play trailer1:57

1 Video

8 Photos

Period Drama Drama History Music

In an insane asylum, Marquis de Sade directs Jean Paul Marat's last days through a theater play. The actors are the patients.In an insane asylum, Marquis de Sade directs Jean Paul Marat's last days through a theater play. The actors are the patients.In an insane asylum, Marquis de Sade directs Jean Paul Marat's last days through a theater play. The actors are the patients.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.5/10

2.7K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 2 wins & 1 nomination total

Videos1

Trailer 1:57

Marat/Sade

Photos8

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
Charenton, the asylum depicted in the film, was established in 1645 and still exists and is still in use, although it is now called the Esquirol Hospital (l'Hôpital Esquirol), named for Jean-Étienne Dominique Esquirol, a French psychiatrist who ran the hospital in the 19th Century.

Quotes
Marquis de Sade: And what's the point of a revolution without general copulation?

Crazy credits
The opening credits - the play's title, stage credits and the actors appearing in the film - pop on the screen, one word at a time, until it is filled. The closing credits - the film's production staff - start off with a full screen of words, and they then pop off the screen, one word at a time, until it is completely empty...just as it was when the film began.

Alternate versions
The first VHS video release of the film, through Water Bearer Films, includes an expositional opening monologue over the opening titles on black.

Connections
Featured in Changing Stages (2000)

User reviews36

Review

Featured review

10/10

The deepest questions of good and evil and free will

I just watched the MGM DVD, which is a fine letterboxed transfer. (I also saw the movie a few years after it was released.)

Marat/Sade is an amazingly original and stunningly powerful philosophical and psychological descent into one of the most complex periods of recorded history, the French Revolution, the Terror that ensued, and the rise of Napoleon and his empire. The multi-layered ideas come thick and fast; I had to watch the movie over two nights because there's so much to think about, and some of the words and images are so overwhelming.

Of the Royal Shakespeare Company actors in the film (little known at the time), Glenda Jackson had the most notable subsequent career, but Ian Richardson (Marat) has also done remarkable things (and he's so young here, you may not recognize him).

This is not a movie for casual entertainment, but if you care about history and the deepest questions of good and evil and free will, you'll find much of value here.