DVD.
Pandaemonium, by Quantock Hills director Julien Temple. Charts the ...

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #58063 in DVD
• Released on: 2002-09-16
• Rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
• Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Anamorphic, PAL, Widescreen
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 119 minutes

Special Features
16:9 Anamorphic Wide Screen
DVD 9
English
Region 2
Dolby Digital Stereo English
Dolby Digital Stereo
Directors Commentary
Featurette
Trailer
Kubla Khan

Synopsis
In this biographical tale about the lives of late-18th-century poets Samuel Taylor Coleridge (Linus Roache) and William Wordsworth (John Hannah), director Julien Temple (THE FILTH AND THE FURY) and screenwriter Frank Cottrell Boyce (HILARY AND JACKIE) come together to present an intriguing, dramatic, historical ode to two remarkable writers.
Between political rallies, poetry parties, and other chaotic gatherings, Coleridge and his wife Sara (Samantha Morton) share an amusing, critical, intellectual, flirtatious friendship with Wordsworth and his sister, Dorothy (Emily Woof). Coleridge's opium habit plays a big part, as many of the scenes seem to drift and change with a dreamlike lucidity. While Coleridge gathers all who will follow to live in the country in what is meant to be a small bohemian utopia, Wordsworth enjoys his literary popularity. But when Dorothy begins to dote on Coleridge, Wordsworth's response is jealous and jaded, causing the beginning of the end of the friendship between the two poets. If not entirely accurate historically, PANDAEMONIUM is supremely entertaining, combining slick visuals with a saucy story with fascinating effect.

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Customer Reviews

The Birth of British Romanticism?
This is quite simply the best film I have seen for years. How I had not heard of it before I am ashamed to admit. For anyone interested in this period of history and in the canon of Romantic poetry, this film is required viewing. It is visually stunning, entertaining, joyous, disturbing and hilarious. When I watched it, I was revising for an exam on Romanticism and it really brought the whole era to life for me. Some of the scenes such as Sir Humphry Davy's hot air balloon are beautiful and funny, while the scene with the helium is hilarious. The young poets' optimism and zest for life is wonderfully portrayed. John Hannah gives a very interesting rendition of Wordsworth's lack of genius compared to Coleridge's natural artistic genius: an imagination as deep as Kubla Khan's 'romantic chasms'. Some scenes are breathtakingly compelling. I wanted the film to go on for at least another hour. Linus Roache's portrayal of Coleridge, with his wide-eyed idealism and later utter addiction to opium is brave and totally, for me, convincing. There are also lovely little touches like the lizard he puts in a bell jar in his garden and calls 'the king of his own little kingdom' an allusion perhaps to his idea, unfulfilled, of a pantisocracy.

While not strictly sticking to the facts at times, who cares? It is the director's zest for the period that shines through. And after all Romanticism was all about Byron's immortal line: ''Tis to create and in creating live'. It is Julien Temple's masterpiece and I beg him to produce more like it.

There are some entertaining 'extras' where the actors' enthusiasm is clearly genuine. One reading of the poem Kubla Khan, each line with a different reader brings the poem to life.

Thank God for the only film about Poetry...
It's rare for a film about poets to actually have much of the poetry they actually wrote in it as well, but this film tries to dramatise quite nice large chunks of both "Kubla Khan" and "The Ancient Mariner" with a bit of "Frost at Midnight" thrown in too. Sex Pistols and pop video director Julien Temple treats them like the rock'n'roll of their day as they really were, and you don't need to know your stuff to enjoy it. Mixing in modern-city day tableaux with scenes from the 1790s (greatest cultural and revolutionary decade until the 1960s didn't you know)the film then brings up to date a world far from stuck in the bookshelf past that most academics try to make it.
Although the nasty-and-jealous character of William Wordsworth may not be wholly accurate (which many academics have hated Julien Temple for) it makes sense for the story as dramatic obstacle and to highlight wider British social and historical issues as the country descends into boring Victoriana, and well - sort of loses its "cool".
Also represented by some of the cream of British acting talent by the way - with both Emily Woof and Samantha Morton in the two strong female roles, this is a really brave and inspiring attempt, and featuring real shots from the beautiful English West Country that Coleridge and Wordworth wrote in, and in which director Julien Temple himself grew up (but he'll tell you that in his commentary and if you don't know anything about the poetry and times either don't worry because he'll explain the lot).

Love in a cold climate
Julian Temple cinematic creation of the story of Wordsworth and Coleridge's tempetuous relationship is moulded in a curiously stark,black & white manner.
In Julian Temple's world, Wordsworth's creative talent is constantly wilting in the shadow of Coleridge's genius. Furthermore, his revolutionary sympathies are a dark betrayal of Coleridge, the genuine apostle of new-ageism and political egalitarianism. Wordsworth harbouring a burning desire to be the establishments' poet laureate and member of the wealthy status quo.
By contrast,sister Dorothy, brilliantly portrayed by Emily Woolf is a genuine subversive and free spirit and recognizes STC's genius as far and above her brother's quota.
Whether this portrayal is accurate is open to dispute but certainly Julian Temple through casting John Hannah as a weak and generally inadequate individual, certainly leaves the viewer with no doubt who his sympathies lie with.
Linus Roache is excellent as STC and his wild eyed, sweat streaked opium induced rantings are both frightening and convincing.
Visually and lyrically impressive but not quite a classic.