After having an impulsive affair with a student, a twice-divorced literature professor moves to the Eastern Cape, where he gets caught up in a mess of post-apartheid politics.
3 October 1967, Angers, Maine-et-Loire, France
22 June 1981, East London, South Africa
9 December 1953, Christopher, Illinois, USA
April 19, 2010
Steve Jacobs' adaptation of J.M. Coetzee's Booker Prize-winning novel Disgrace fearlessly pares back the layers of post-Apartheid South Africa within the microcosm of a father/daughter relationship.September 25, 2009
Demanding but ultimately rewarding...September 25, 2009
Unfortunately, though Malkovich remains a compelling and cerebral screen presence, he comes off as too innately detached and prickly to elicit much empathy (not that his character is asking for it, mind you).December 04, 2009
It's an enormously complicated story with great potential for reductive schmaltz, but this is avoided thanks to Anna Maria Monticelli's sharp, sensitive screenplay and superb performances.September 24, 2009
Disgrace is an ugly movie, at times torturous to watch. It probably needs to be.December 04, 2009
Surprisingly successful adaptation.December 04, 2009
A perfectly cast John Malkovich gives a superb performance in a powerful and intelligent study of a man coming back from the brink.December 11, 2009
This chilly film gets surprisingly close to the tone of Coetzee's precise prose.December 11, 2009
If you know the novel, you're likely to feel that something has been lost here; if you don't, you still have the film's monotonous pacing to contend with. Still, Jacobs has directed an intelligent, intriguing drama.December 04, 2009
It's hard to say what this solid but unadventurous film adds to Coetzee's powerful source material.October 02, 2009
The movie eventually begins to wilt under the sober, plodding direction of Steve Jacobs, but the thoughtful screenplay gives Malkovich a complex, increasingly reflective character arc that he plays with great feeling.September 24, 2009
I awaited the closing scenes of Disgrace with a special urgency, because the story had gripped me deeply but left me with no idea how it would end. None -- and I really cared.