Director: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
"We wanted to get a smile from the audience, and this was the case, but we did not expect such success. It was just a very small film, and it was risky because I knew I was going to talk about generosity and it's a risk, because today it is more fashionable to speak about violence."
"I wanted Paris to be there, at the heart of the picture. But, like Kurosawa, I believed that every shot should be like a painting. I searched in Parisian imagery everything that appeals to me [but] all my location scouting was done in vain. Then, we cleared the streets of all the cars, cleaned the graffiti off the walls, replaced posters with more colorful ones, etc. Let's just say I tried to exert as much control as I could upon the city's aesthetic quality."
Jean-Pierre Jeunet from Indiewire
Film, of course, can be both at once but sometimes the art form is nothing more than a guilty pleasure and Amélie -- being more personal than political -- fits right into this category.
Amélie (Audrey Tautou) is a sweet natured young woman who has grown up separated from school and a normal social life due to her misunderstanding parents. A wide-eyed loner in adulthood she becomes determined to break out of her isolation. Her life changes the day Princess Diana dies. Not because she really cares for the Princess but because when she hears the news she drops a bottle top that roles under a hole in the wall where there is a hidden treasure that was left by a young boy thirty years before. Curious as to whom this treasure belongs to she sets out to find him and return it. She finds a secret, nifty way to return it and when the man finds it he weeps for nostalgia and joy for having found his lost youth - (think of Charles Foster Kane finding his sled).
This sets Amélie on a course of good will. And over the next few days she begins to live vicariously through others by doing Samaritan acts to make people happy. What's obvious to us -- as well as her eccentric neighbor -- is that Amélie does nothing for herself. The only real question the film asks is when will Amélie reach out for the love that she wants and deserves?
Admittedly, this is a feel good (or shallow) premise but the film is directed with such gosh, wow technical prowess that it will thrill most audiences. Using stylish angles, saturated colors, roving camera shots and dizzying edits the film bounds along, leaving most of the audience breathless for more. Frankly, I really enjoyed this film the two times I saw it and while I can acknowledge that it isn't nearly as good as some of the other French films this year - such as Under the Sand - it is still a very good film. Or more accurately it's a crowd pleasing film that's well made.
One could criticize the film's simplicity; the main actress has a doe-eyed innocence and all of the other characters are rather cartoon-like - but the film doesn't ask us to consider a greater theme. It asks us to think about as much as Walt Disney's Snow White does - and you'd be hard pressed to find critics of Snow White - except by curmudgeons who think enjoying a film is a bourgeois conceit. And, if you recall, the first quote up top Jeunet wanted to simply get a smile out of the audience.
Some have criticized Amélie for being calculated and overly stylized, but that's losing sight of the fact that it is a movie. It isn't French realism. It's a fairy tale and all of its conceits (calculated or not) are geared toward that end. Yes, the film has an inherent predictability - it's too happy a movie to suddenly take a 180-degree turn into darkness. But what's important to note is that in the movie's specific and charming details it goes where the audience wishes it to go, not where the audience knows it will go. There is a difference.
Another big criticism of the film is that Jeunet (who co-directed Delicatessen and The City of Lost Children) seems to have cleaned the streets of black people and minorities in the same way that he cleaned the graffiti off the walls. But this criticism is an illogical double standard. One would have to make the assumption that Jeunet is a right wing travel agent or worse a racist - but nowhere in his interviews or writings can this be detected. True, Jeunet doesn't present the real Paris but then again neither did Jean Renoir, Rene Claire or Eric Rohmer. Why is it okay for Eric Rohmer to have a bunch of white, rich people running around France looking for love but it's not okay for Jeunet to have one white woman doing the same?
In some critics circles this film is hated. Check out Manohla (LA Weekly) Dargis' review here. Personally, I think Manohla is being political rather than specifically critical to the film. She dislikes the movie because it is heavily promoted by Miramax, because 30 million French loved it and because it's a light comedy - but no where does she actually discuss the film's message about finding oneself through kindness toward others. I guess that's a trite message.
Other reviews are just plain loony. Check out Kenneth Turan's review in the Los Angeles Times. The headline reads: Mean Streak Hurts 'Amélie' A headline that is so off the mark you wonder if Turan saw the film or just walked into the middle of it for one scene and then left convinced it was a nasty little French film with a kind hearted message merely sprinkled at the edges.
Many of these critics seem simply to be sounding off loudly in long articles to let the world know that they disapprove. It's a form of critical self promotion.
Amélie may be promoted like it's the greatest thing since French bread and caviar but Jeunet didn't make it with that intention. He has made a love story with all kinds of humorous twists and he added a few technical marvels to it and in the process it has become enormously successful. So sue him.
Part of the reason Amélie is meeting resistance is because it has been so successful. Any movie that becomes a mega-hit inevitably is set up to get a backlash. And this is especially true of foreign films because everybody knows foreign films are supposed to be far more sophisticated and deeper than Hollywood films. It also happened to Cinema Paradiso and Life is Beautiful - two good if less than perfect films. All I can say is go see the film for yourself and judge it on the merits of its own message and its own fantastic reality and if you accept it I'm sure you'll be thoroughly amused.
If not - well - then go suck lemons.
Matt Langdon