Hello. The film we shall be discussing this month is

Amélie (Jean-Pierre Jeunet, 2001)

 

Cheapest place to buy the film (£3.49): http://www.play.com/DVD/DVD/4-/99419/Amelie/Product.html

 

Feel free to watch it and join in on discussion of the film in this thread.

 

(for info on the buzzjack film club go here: http://www.buzzjack.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=123079 )

 

 

Anyone feel free to start the discussion once they have watched it. If you wanted feel free to write your own review/response on the film to help discussion.

 

Read forward with caution if you have not watched it yet, as they may be spoilers in this thread.

 

 

To help discussion start here is an article on the film I have found:

 

Once I have watched it myself I may add some possible discussion start points in this post as well.

 

The Fabulous Worlds of Jean-Pierre Jeunet

 

By Steve Biodrowski • September 16, 2008

 

Audrey Tautou and Jean-Pierre Jenuet on the set of AMELIE.French filmmaker Jean-Pierre Jeunet is probably most well known to American mainstream audiences for directing ALIEN: RESURRECTION, the fourth entry in the science-fiction franchise starring Sigourney Weaver. But in his native country, he has made a trio of stylish features which he helped conceive and develop from scratch. The first two, DELICATESSEN and THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN, were done in collaboration with Marc Caro. The third — and so far his best work — is AMELIE, a romantic comedy fantasy that stands out as one of the best films released last year.

 

Because of the elaborate visuals in his films (with and without Caro, who served as ‘artistic director’ on DELICATESSEN and CITY), Jeunet is thought of more as a directorial stylist than an ‘auteur,’ but he contributed to the writing of all three of his French films, and he conceived the story and structure for AMELIE before bringing on a collaborator to work on the final script. Interestingly, AMELIE displays many of the stylistic elements apparent in his earlier work, but this time they are wed to a story that is far more personal and charming, with a warm depth of feeling missing from the black comedies he made with Caro and from his Hollywood horror movie.

 

Jeunet’s solo effort AMELIE details the adventures of the title character (played by Audrey Tautou), whose childhood disappointments (such as having to release her suicidal goldfish into a stream) leads her to become a reserved and shy young woman who avoids becoming emotionally involved with people. Her life changes when she discovers a small box of childhood mementos in her apartment, which she contrives to reunite with its owner. This success leads her to embark on a quest to help others, including her widowed father, whom she persuades to travel by stealing his garden gnome and sending it on a trip around the world, courtesy of a friend, who sends back snapshots of the wandering statue in front of various recognizable monuments.

 

However, Amelie’s biggest challenge is overcoming her own inhibition, which forces her to work by means of elaborate schemes that keep her always at a distance from those she is helping. When she briefly crosses paths with a young man (Matthieu Kassovitz) whose hobby is collecting photographs found discarded at public photo booths, she finds herself smitten, and embarks upon a plan to get his attention by returning his photo album, which he has accidentally left behind. Much of the movie’s joy arises from the way Amelie?s strategy (planting clues, making calls to pay phones, allowing herself to be glimpsed only from a distance) serves to make her intriguing while at the same time delaying the face-to-face romantic meeting that she simultaneously desires and fears.

 

According to Jeunet, AMELIE is a film he had been wanting to make for over twenty-five years. ‘When I arrived in Paris in ‘74, I began to do some notes in my notebook,’ he recalls. ‘I did a kind of collection of stories, memories. Almost everything is true. Not the garden gnome — I heard that story two hundred times. But almost all the stories are true. For example, the story with the goldfish — that’s my story. And the story of the photo-book is true?a friend of mine has a collection going for five years maybe. It?s a real book. We did a fake one for the film, because we had to get that organization of images.’

 

During the decades that the concept for AMELIE was little more than notes, Jeunet made DELICATESSEN and THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. The first is a black comedy about an (apparently) post-apocalyptic world suffering from food shortages, where the butcher on the ground floor of an apartment building occasionally carves up new tenants to sell to his regular costumers. Where did the creator of AMELIE come up with such a bizarre idea? ‘It was very simple,’ he claims. ‘I had a flat. Just under my bedroom was the store for the butcher. Every morning at 7:00, I heard ‘Chop, chop!’ My girlfriend told me, “It’s time to move. They are killing the neighbor, and it will be our turn in one week.” I thought, “Ah! That’s a good idea!”‘

 

This became Jeunet’s first produced feature film, thanks to limited locations and sets that made it affordable. ‘I had written two or three scripts together with Marc Caro, and it was too expensive — impossible to make a short feature. We lost ten years,’ he laments. ‘At this time, I thought, “Okay, [DELICATESSEN] is only one small setting, not a lot of people. It was very cheap, compared to THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN, for example. It was very difficult to find the money. My producer [took] one year. Nobody wanted to do DELICATESSEN. Because at this time, it was only the Nouvelle Vague.’

 

Jeunet is referring to the famous French film movement of the ’60s (known as ‘New Wave’ in the U.S.). With its emphasis on realism and ordinary life, often filmed on real locations, the aesthetic of the New Wave movement stood in opposition to what Jeunet and Caro wanted to achieve with DELICATESSEN. ‘Forget the French New Wave!’ Jeunet states. ‘It was fifty years ago! In the end, we are going to lose and forget the New Wave. Because now we have a new generation of directors, and we try to make movies for the audience, not only for ourselves like the New Wave. I don’t like New Wave. Sorry. Maybe [Francois] Truffaut, and that’s it.’

 

Nevertheless, DELICATESSEN was a hit, earning its co-directors an international reputation and helping them to secure financing for a follow-up. CITY OF LOST CHILDREN was written by the same team of Jeunet and Caro in collaboration with Gilles Adrien, but the script actually predated their first film. ‘We wrote CITY before DELICATESSEN, and it was too expensive,’ Jeunet explains. ‘It was difficult to write the story, and I feel you can tell from the film. Now, I think we did a mistake. The story in a film is so important; you have to have the story before you do it. With CITY, it was the opposite. We wanted to make a film in a harbor with big boats, before we had the story.’ Laughing, he quickly adds, ‘That’s not to say it’s bad!’

 

The visual style of DELICATESSEN and CITY led to the offer to come to Hollywood and direct ALIEN: RESURRECTION. But throughout all this time, Jeunet had been saving AMELIE. ‘This is a film I wanted to make for a long time,’ he explains. ‘When I made the films with Marc Caro? — you know we are not lovers; we are not brothers; we are just friends. I wanted to put some personal emotions in the film, and that’s the reason I kept this story for myself. I love black humor, but I wanted to make a positive story for my film. After ALIEN, especially, I craved freedom. I wanted to come back to Paris to make my own film with complete freedom.’

 

When Jeunet finally sat down to work out the script (with Guillaume Laurant), he remembered the lesson learned from writing CITY and made sure to have a strong structure that would tie together the multiple narrative threads from his notebook. ‘It wasn’t easy to find the concept,’ he relates. ‘To write one script with 200 stories was a real mess, believe me. I spent a lot of time to find the concept. In fact, the story of the woman helping other people was just one small story in the middle, and after awhile, one morning — I don’t know why — it was in front of me; I understood, ‘Oh, this is the center of the film.’ At this time, everything was easy to write — easy to find the money, easy to shoot. Everything was easy. I had everything I needed, and it was okay, because after ALIEN I was a big star in France.’

 

AMELIE is ultimately a love story, but one crafted with so much imagination and style that it edges into the realm of fantasy. This approach does not always earn critical approval in France, but according to Jeunet, ‘For this one, it was an exception: 450 good reviews and only six bad reviews.’ Still, the film was turned down for a slot at the Cannes films festival, a decision that the writer-director now considers with amusement. ‘After awhile, all critics began to give very good reviews, and everybody wanted to kill the boss at the Cannes Festival! For me it wasn’t a big deal; it’s just a festival. You know, we did the opening of Cannes with CITY OF LOST CHILDREN, and when you do the opening it’s a nightmare, because everybody in France wants to kill you, so I was pretty relieved to avoid the Cannes Festival.’

 

Not only a critical success, the film was a blockbuster in its native country before being picked up for distribution in the United States by Miramax, who positioned the film as a contender for Best Foreign Language Film at that year’s Oscars. Did the tremendous success take Jeunet by surprise. ‘Not at all!’ he responds with mock indignation. Then more seriously he says, ‘Sometimes, I think I’m dreaming. I didn’t expect a success like this, and I don’t understand why. I can tell you something,’ he adds. ‘I receive so many letters from young people, and they need romantic love stories. They are tired of hearing about condoms! They prefer this kind of story.’

Ahh, this is the one I wanted least as I've seen it and know it's not great but I cant remember it enough to discuss it lol. I think I'm going to check out the other three as well anyway ^_^

I was surprised this won as well given I thought everybody had seen it already.

I hadn't seen any of the four, but this was my last choice. As it doesn't look like it'll be my thing anyway. But I WILL rent this and watch it as i'm willing to give it a go.

i really like this i saw it last year cos everyone was bugging me to so i borrowed it off a friend and i'm so glad i did. it's not one of the best films i don't think because i wasn't really that engrossed by the story i was more interested in the way it was shot and little quirky moments like the suicidal goldfish and the way it mentioned things like her mother hating how her fingers go wrinkly after having a bath, how her father loved it when he'd peel big strips of wallpaper off the wall and how amelie loved looking back at peoples faces in the cinema which i'm sure a lot of people do (i definitely do! :P) not to mention all the other things which people can really relate to which is the first time i've ever seen that kind of thing used in any film i've seen. it's little things like that that made the film for me rather than the main part of her trying to return the photos to that guy which i felt was just really dragged out when a lot more little stories i think would have kept me more interested. though saying that i did love the ending where you find out who the guy actually was.

 

i can't think of anything else to say really. i did really like it especially how it's kind of made from loads of small and irrelevant moments rather than depending on a big story throughout like most films do but saying that i feel it got a bit boring at parts and it's not something i'd watch over and over again..

 

8/10! :)

I'll try and squeeze this in, in the next few days.

OK so I've just re-watched Amelie and I feel more so than ever that it's one of those films where the more times you see it the less it appeals. There are many things to like about Amelie. Jean-Pierre Jeunet is a fine director with the right material (ie not Alien films) and The City Of Lost Children is among the finest of French cinema and this is the right sort of vehicle for his talents. Indeed some of the cinematography is exceptional and Jeunet use his flair for the fine details and strong visuals throughout the film.

All of the main cast are right for their respective roles and particularly Audrey Tatou in the title role. A role that made her into the star she is now. Indeed her career almost seems haunted by it. The script again is clever, witty and at times very charming and the plot whilst not overly simplistic is straightforward with various barely obscured messages about the problems of shyness, fantasising, living your life through others or indeed in the past.

The soundtrack again compliments the visuals very and helps to conjure the image of an idyllic French world that, even though it is largely set in what was modern day (1997) seems nostalgic for a gentler, more relaxed time. Anyone who's been to Paris in the last 20 years will tell you it isn't quite that way any more and is a much more multi-cultural, bustling city than projected here, although to be fair elementd remain.

For me though my biggest problem with the movies lies in the central character as I just cannot relate to someone like that. I understand the reasons given for her behaviour as the opening 30 mins tell us this pretty clearly but I spend the entire film wanting to slap her around the face and tell her to get real. I find it rather frustrating in places too and by the end I'm thinking thank God for that, she's finally done it. The scenes with The Glass Man also kind of infuriate me as the metaphor of the girl in the painting and Amelie seems a touch clumsy and overdone.

 

The film is at it's strongest in the opening 30 mins where the script is at its freshest and punchiest and the editing is top notch. Never lingering too long or too little over a shot. After that initial rush however things calm down and by an hour in it has reached a bit of a crawl and sags slightly in the middle. Things pick up again towards the final act and there's some nice touches throughout. My favourite of which is the travelling gnome and the Ghost Train ride.

 

All in all Amelie is a good film and a very fine example of not only French but European cinema's ability to make films that are less predictable, formulaic and more intelligent than the standard Hollywood fare. It's by no means a film I will particularly wish to see again, as frankly twice is enough for me, but twice seems reasonable. I respect this film, I respect the director (largely) and agree that the degree of acclaim and popularity it has acheived over the years is warranted but Romantic Comedies are just not my thing.

 

 

 

 

It's been a long time since I've had to actually type up a review for a film so I hope that wasn't too confusing :D

Almost downloaded, I shall get to watching it this week.

 

Hopefully I can understand it and write a decent and readable review..

Interesting choice, i'll try an get this during the week ^_^

I shall watch it in original with subtitles, i guess that would be better, i don't want to get re-used to watching dubbed versions. :puke: Many stuff get lost in translation etc.

I shall watch it in original with subtitles, i guess that would be better, i don't want to get re-used to watching dubbed versions. :puke: Many stuff get lost in translation etc.

 

I don't think there is a dubbed version.

 

also your current user name is stupid.

I don't think there is a dubbed version.

 

also your current user name is stupid.

Well i was talking about russian dubbed versions, EVERYTHING is dubbed here. People don't like to learn english and watch films/shows in original. -_-

 

Duly noted. (not really)

Well i was talking about russian dubbed versions, EVERYTHING is dubbed here. People don't like to learn english and watch films/shows in original. -_-

 

Duly noted. (not really)

 

ohhh, i was assuming English being dubbed, my bad, some things can be dubbed really good to be fair, but subtitles > bad dub any day of the week, i guess it can be to do with language as well, where some places an English dub can sound and look authentic where as Russian just wouldnt fit.

 

and your username is annoying for PMs.

ohhh, i was assuming English being dubbed, my bad, some things can be dubbed really good to be fair, but subtitles > bad dub any day of the week, i guess it can be to do with language as well, where some places an English dub can sound and look authentic where as Russian just wouldnt fit.

 

and your username is annoying for PMs.

Subtitles can be awful as well, but as long as you get the whole picture and these subs are not BUILT-IN (the worst thing EVER!) it's OK! And I don't really get what you mean about dubbing. They make everything 'fit' and stuff. Of course except different english/american accents, any analogies to which in the film would be not understandable, and difference between words 'hear' & 'here', etc. etc., make phrases rhyme is a hard thing to do too. And since literally 90% of films here in cinemas are english/american (because russian films nowadays are complete and utter $h!t, try-hards) everything here is dubbed. The funny thing is that DVDRips of a film in original and with dubbed audio may leak with difference in time of like 3 months, like it happened with '13'. :lol:

 

Nobody really PMs me that much anyway :cry:

 

 

Anyways, downloaded 'Amelie', should watch soon. :D

I remember seeing Amelie on tv once. It was alright i guess but im not to keen on watching it again :( Oh well i will for the sake of the film club.

Edited January 5, 201114 yr by JAM123

Ok so i've just watched Amélie. Its only my 2nd ever film that I have watched that is not in English.

 

Anyways it started off well, I thought the littlle girl who played a young Amélie was really cute and seemed funny, also I liked the way it introduced every character with their likes and dislikes, I found some bits rather funny. After it switched to when she was older and she was working in that Bar/Cafe and Searching for various things it still seemed watchable. I liked the monologue throughout and I thought that added to the film. I also really liked some of the people in it such as one of the Bar women and the lady behind the cigarette counter.

 

I don't know whether it was the fact that it was in French and that I couldn't seem to follow the subtitles well enough or whether I just didn't find it all that exciting but it seemed to go nowhere for me, it started off well but I seemed to lose more and more interest as it went on. I am a newbie to foreign language films so mabye that had something to do with it.

 

Anyways I don't have that much to say, hopefully I will like the next one a bit more. Overall I'd give it a 4.5/10

Edited January 9, 201114 yr by Lukuzz

I'm rubbish at reviews but hey here goes.

 

The start was a little hit and miss at first, probably because I was wondering when the narrator would stop :lol: Narration aside, I did enjoy the young Amelie story getting us into why she was so shy later in life. But the Canadian tourist suicide :lol: did bring a chuckle (a little wrong I know :lol:). The story did drag a little in the middle with me just wishing Amelie would get together with her monsieur. Cinematography and the effects throughout were rather good though, from the talking lamps to the photographs. I did like the whole gnome thing when it clicked at the end with her Dad finally going off travelling. A nice touch there!

 

I live in a similar style shy bubble so I can relate to parts of it so I wouldn't say it was beyond the realms of possibility for a real life Amelie out there.

 

Only the 4th foreign film I've seen, but it's up against a good trio (Downfall, Grave Of The Fireflies, Pans Labyrinth). I'd probably put ahead of Downfall, but I didn't connect to it as well as the first two above. Still I would recommend giving it a watch, seeing as you can get it really cheap now.

 

7.5/10

I enjoyed the film, definatly a lot of interesting things in the filmaking and the narrative style.

 

The film was far more expressionistic than I realised at times, such as the rainfall when they got rid of the fish (the rain showing the mood of Ameile at the time). The whole filmmaking style of the film was very playful, and things such as the saturation, and much of the editing helped show the slight surrealness of the film which i'm sure was to put us in the imaginative mind of Ameile.

 

The narrative style was also interesting, particulary the use of the narrator, who was heavily used at the start, and returned a few times throughout, you don't get many films, especially recent films that use a narrator much, and I think he was used to show Ameile's shyness, Ameile was too shy to push the story forward, so the narrator did it for us.

 

I quite like the message of the film too, which my personal view of the message anyway is, that the small good things we do for people, can bring a lot of happiness, and even change view's on life (such as the first man, who we see with his grandson at the climax of the film).

 

I also found the characters very interesting (particulary Ameile), they all had fairly developed personalities that were quirky yet realistic, I think the backing story (particulary with the likes/dislikes at the start) helped with this alot, as these are very specific things about one's personalities, yet something we don't see in most personalities in films, we never get told that a character likes popping bubble wrap in a film, yet it surprisingly makes the character in this much more interesting, it feels like in that small amount of time, we are invested into the characters mind, a very interesting technique of character development.

 

 

Overall, I thought the filmmaking was top notch, Jeunet is a real talent, that combined with an interesting and unique story with a interesting lead character made a great film, 7.5/10

btw chris seeing as though a couple of us have rated it so far maybe at the end of each film discussion they could be rounded up to an average to compare the rating with future ones or whatever.. just an idea

Edited January 6, 201114 yr by JakeWild

For me though my biggest problem with the movies lies in the central character as I just cannot relate to someone like that. I understand the reasons given for her behaviour as the opening 30 mins tell us this pretty clearly but I spend the entire film wanting to slap her around the face and tell her to get real. I find it rather frustrating in places too and by the end I'm thinking thank God for that, she's finally done it. The scenes with The Glass Man also kind of infuriate me as the metaphor of the girl in the painting and Amelie seems a touch clumsy and overdone.

 

The film is at it's strongest in the opening 30 mins where the script is at its freshest and punchiest and the editing is top notch. Never lingering too long or too little over a shot. After that initial rush however things calm down and by an hour in it has reached a bit of a crawl and sags slightly in the middle. Things pick up again towards the final act and there's some nice touches throughout. My favourite of which is the travelling gnome and the Ghost Train ride.

 

All in all Amelie is a good film and a very fine example of not only French but European cinema's ability to make films that are less predictable, formulaic and more intelligent than the standard Hollywood fare. It's by no means a film I will particularly wish to see again, as frankly twice is enough for me, but twice seems reasonable. I respect this film, I respect the director (largely) and agree that the degree of acclaim and popularity it has acheived over the years is warranted but Romantic Comedies are just not my thing.

It's been a long time since I've had to actually type up a review for a film so I hope that wasn't too confusing :D

 

I sort of felt the metaphor with the girl in the painting was overdone on purpose, like Amelie and the glass man both knew they were talking about her. I felt I could relate to her as a character (I am extremely shy), so I guess that just depends on who is watching.

 

I'm not sure whether I agree that the first 30 minutes are best or not, they definatly bring us into the quirky world of the film in a successful way, possibly the msot interesting 30 minutes of the film, i definatly enjoyed her backstory alot, but it appears I might be in a minority that I think the bulk of the film was just as good.

 

I think i can agree with your conclusion, the filmmaking of Amelie is superb and really shows how independent european cinema can be far more interesting (especially with expressionism) than your standard Hollywood, I'm not the biggest fan of Rom-Com's but I found this much more interesting than your average rom-com, the story wasnt 100% focused on the romance, more focused on the unique mind of Amelie, which is partly why I found it more interesting than the average rom-com, and also I think the fact it was an independent French film helped (fun filmmaking style, not in the boundries that Hollywood films have).