Posted by admin on August 24, 2011 in Consultant-Home Business ·
| Cast: |
| Audrey Tautou… |
…Amelie Poulan |
| Mathieu Kassovitz… |
…Nino Quicampoix |
| Rufus… |
…Raphael Poulain |
| Lorella Cravotta… |
…Amandine Poulain |
| Claire Maurier… |
…Suzanne |
| Urbain Cancelier… |
…Collignon |
| Michel Robin… |
…Old Man Collignon |
|
- Directed by: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Written by: Guillaume Laurant and Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Rated R for sexual content
Running Time: 1 hour, 53 minutes
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| Parisian Passion |
 “Amelie” is a movie in love. It’s in love with its story. It’s in love with its characters. And it is especially in love with its Parisian setting. The director, Jean-Pierre Jeunet (“Delicatessen,” “The City of Lost Children”), shot the film in over eighty locales throughout Paris including the Cathedral of Notre Dame and Le Sacre Coeur. He houses a passion for the city that filters through every frame of his latest endeavor.The movie is the most whimsical of romantic comedies. Amelie Poulain (twenty-three year old newcomer Audrey Tautou) is a somewhat lonely but hopeful young woman whose simple life of waiting tables takes an unusual turn when she makes a strange discovery in her tiny apartment. Beneath the floorboards a dormant box of childhood memorabilia is awakened by Amelie’s curious hands. After a little bit of detective work, she locates the man to whom the shoe box of cherished memories belongs. In strict anonymity she returns it, and watches from a distance as the man’s life is subsequently transformed. Amelie’s own existence takes on a whole new meaning as well, as she now makes it her mission to transform the lives of all with whom she comes into contact; from the regulars who frequent the coffee shop on a daily basis to the vendors she encounters on the street. If someone is in need of a fateful upturn, she intervenes and concocts a little emotional boost. By contrast, if someone is deserving of a deflation of the ego, she wastes no time in plotting a little innocuous but hilarious revenge. She changes the lives around her while maintaining her self-imposed place in life’s shadows.Her anonymity is her most effective tool, but it becomes complicated when she meets a quiet and intriguing young man named Nino (Mathieu Kassovitz). A new dilemma makes itself known as Amelie, who has become a little too accustomed to hiding, must now decide if she’s willing and able to let her guard of secrecy down, put her self-worth on the line, and trust her own ability to love completely.I’ve heard the film described as a kind of French “Ally McBeal,” and it is enveloped with a similar glossy coat of whimsical artistry. Jeunet sets the tone beautifully by opening the story with a quirky narration that gives us the inside scoop on the many mundane events that were transpiring at the exact moment of Amelie’s conception. (Not her birth, mind you, but her conception.) We’re also rapidly introduced to her parnets in a curtailed “personal ad” kind of way. (Their habits, likes and dislikes.) In fact, Amelie’s entire childhood is waggishly abridged in the story’s first few minutes, including insight into her own eccentricities. (An example: when going to a movie, her favorite thing to do is watch the facial expressions of the audience members, but she hates it in old movies when drivers don’t watch the road yet are able to navigate with stunning ease.) The screenplay by Jeunet and Guillaume Laurant introduces us to Amelie while simultaneously getting us in touch with her insatiable sense of hopeful curiosity, as she wonders such things as exactly how many people in the city are having orgasms at a precise moment in time. (That question is followed by a gleeful montage of humorous climaxes.)The cinematography by Bruno Delbonnel (“The Cat’s Meow”) conducts its own love affair with Paris; offering not a naturalistic depiction of the city so much as a magical metropolis where dreams are waiting in virtually every shadow, ready to be discovered.Audrey Tautou wastes no time in endearing her character to the audience. With the look of someone desperately trying to conceal a happy secret, she creates a vestibule of comfortable curiosity for the viewer, like a tour guide all too eager to take us by the hand and lead us onto a roller coaster of serendipitous occurances. Her bouts with childhood isolation are also made present, which gains our sympathy and strengthens our need to see her happy.I really liked this film. It’s a wonderous concoction that whets a movie lover’s appetite for engaging, lighthearted romance. With a palette cleansed by such a numbing array of many recent zero-interest cinematic efforts, “Amelie” is a treasure for the taste buds. |