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"Amelie"
(Reviewed January 22, 2002)
-
Completely wonderful French romantic fable, the kind of charmingly sweet movie that Hollywood never, ever manages to get right. (Just imagine how retchingly unwatchable this would be with Meg Ryan or Julia Roberts in the lead, directed by some tasteless, vulgar hack, with its script "adapted" for the American monkeyminded masses by seven or eight unclever asswipes who wouldn't know an honest human emotion if it punched them right in their smug, overpaid faces.)
I was lucky enough to see "Amelie" director Jean-Pierre Jeunet's earlier "Delicatessan" and "City of Lost Children" on a double bill in early January. The visual style of those films has been rightly compared to Terry Gilliam's work, but Jeunet's movies also have a quirky sentimentality that is very, well, *French*.
"Amelie" is even more endearing than those movies. Star Audrey Tatou is perfect as a shy mademoiselle who schemes to change the lives of several people around her, but is reluctant to risk meeting the man of her dreams face to face.
Jeunet is an amazingly clever director, with lots of intricate camera moves and setups that belong in a picture book, but his technical prowess never overwhelms what is at its heart a movie with a lot of heart.
One of my 10 favorite films of 2001--need I say more?
Back Row Grade: A
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