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copyright ©1999-2002
DigsMagazine.com.
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Amelie [Le Fabuleux destin d’Amélie
Poulain] 2001
Directed by: Jean-Pierre
Jeunet
Written by: Guillaume Laurant, Jean-Pierre Jeunet [story]
Starring: Audrey Tautou, Mathieu Kassovitz
Language: French [with English subtitles]
Look for it at the video store under:
foreign [France]
Watch it when you’re in the mood
for
something: artsy-fartsy,
fantastical,
lovey,
whimsical
The critic says:
/
5 the rating system
explained
Fun factor: /5 |
Plot synopsis
Growing up in Paris as the only child of a
nerve-wracked mother and an emotionally distant father, Amélie Poulain
learned from an early age to retreat into the fabulous world of her
imagination to seek the fun and company she lacked in real life. At 23,
living on her own and spending her days working as a waitress at a
nearby café/bar, Amélie continues to hide from the loneliness of
reality by making up amazing stories about the people around her. Then
one day, Amélie makes a tiny discovery that changes the course of her
life. When a tile at the base of a wall in her apartment is
inadvertently knocked loose one evening, Amélie stumbles across a small
hollow, a secret hiding spot in which an earlier tenant, a small boy,
has stashed a box of his greatest treasures: a clipping of a cyclist,
some figurines, a stack of photographs. Amélie decides to track down
the box’s now grown-up owner and bring him this reminder of his
childhood. The man is so touched that he immediately decides to make
some changes to make his own life happier, and Amélie, thrilled that
her small act of kindness has made such a difference in the life of this
stranger, vows to continue her do-good work. She paints a word picture
for a blind man she encounters crossing a street, schemes to convince
her house-bound widower father to get out and see the world, finds love
for her lonely, hypochondriac co-worker. But when in the course of her
exploits around Paris, she falls in love with Nino, fellow daydreamer
and obsessive collector of other people’s discarded photobooth
pictures, Amélie, who has such a talent for making others happy,
suddenly finds herself at a loss as to how to make happiness happen in
her own life.
Review
It’s hard to make an unabashedly happy
movie that doesn’t ooze cheese as well. But Amélie is all
goodness and light, cheer and optimism, a 100% feel-good movie that
fills you with joy and makes you believe in love without once falling
into the usual corny territory occupied by other romantic comedies. This
is one love story that doesn’t fake it: the entire movie is suffused
with that gorgeous glow that you get when you know you’re in love. It’s
not about love so much as it is love, a great big giant
valentine to human quirks, the interconnectedness of individual lives,
the unpredictability of falling in love, and the romance of Paris
itself. Much of the magic comes from Amélie’s enchantingly
adorable star, Audrey Tautou, who with her big doe eyes and mischievous
coy smile, is the living embodiment of charm and grace and vivaciousness—you
can’t imagine not falling head over heels for her: she’s pretty much
the perfect girl. But the secondary characters are just as lovable –
from Amélie’s father, obsessed with creating a tacky shrine to his
dead wife, to her painter neighbor, the fragile Glass Man, to Lucien,
the not-so-bright grocer’s clerk who finds such beauty in the
vegetables he sells, to Amélie’s love interest Nino, whose day-job at
a porno shop seems at odds with his sweet and innocent nature. Still, it’s
the unmistakably distinctive painterly touch of director Jean-Pierre
Jeunet, who along with Marc Caro, created two of the most beautifully
weird films of the 90s, Delicatessen
and The City of Lost Children, that makes Amélie so
one-of-a-kind special. With its super-saturated red-green-yellow palette
punctuated by occasional brilliant blues, and its snappy, jazzy editing,
this gorgeous modern fairytale is one luscious concoction of cinematic
eye candy that’s impossible to resist. —reviewed by
Y. Sun
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