Amelie
(2001)
A Miramax/UGC
Picture
Directed by: Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Starring: Audrey Tautou (Amelie),
Mathieu Kassovitz (Nino), Serge Merlin (the Glass
Man), Claire Maurier (Suzanne), Rufus (Amelie's
Dad)
Running Time: 2 hours, 2 minutes
MPAA Rating: R
Official
Website Link | Buy
it from Amazon |
SPECIAL
FEATURES
The Look of Amelie
Fantasies of Audrey Tautou
Q & A with Director Jean-Pierre Jeunet
Q & A with Director and Cast
Auditions
Storyboard comparisons
"Home Movies" Inside the Making of Amelie
TV spots and Trailers in English and French
Cast and Crew information
The Amelie Scrapbook
These special features are pretty cool, but besides for the
director special features, most are in French so you still
have to read subtitles to understand. But seeing how they
came up with the look of this film is fascinating.
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Lowdown:
A French foreign film. I know, puhlease. But watch it. Turn
on the English captions. And you'll fall in love with Amelie's
transformation and the magical way the sights and sounds seamlessly
blend together, making you wish you were French and lived
in Paris. Seriously. No need to rent. Buy it. |
The Girl with the Water Glass
An extremely charming movie that hooks
you from the get go and keeps you enrapt for the next 2 hours.
And you even have to read subtitles, unless you understand
French.
Amelie tells the tale of an adorable
little girl whose jittery mother dies tragically and is left
with her emotionless father. To occupy the time she lives
in a fantasy world of bunny rabbit clouds and homemade vinyl
records, not to mention a suicidial goldfish. Time eventually
moves on though, and Amelie grows up and moves from the Parisian
suburbs into the colorful world of Montmartre, although not
quite so colorful as the one found in Moulin
Rouge. Her life is still lonely and she has a few friends
at work, but no lasting love. All that changes though with
the shock of Princess Di's death and a discovery behind a
loose bathroom tile. Amelie embarks on a quest to do some
good with that discovery, which leads her to continue involving
herself in others' lives and trying to make them better. If
this weren't such a light-hearted, optomistic movie, I would
say that she's being quite nosy. But I digress. What Amelie
forgets to do though is try to make her own life a little
better, but fate and destiny have other things planned for
Amelie.
It's a nice story, and is effectively
told. What will really get you in your seat though is the
beautiful way that the story is told. Paris is already beautiful,
but through the lens and vision of Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Paris
becomes surreal. His use of greens, reds, and blues to convey
various locales and emotions is gorgeous. Not to mention,
Audrey Tautou as Amelie is unbelievably beautiful. The cherry
on top in this movie is the fantastic soundtrack of Parisian
accordians and strings. The upbeat and romantic Parisian sounds
carry you aloft in this movie and you really won't want to
come back to reality while seeing this. (It also helps to
see and hear this on a widescreen tv with surround sound).
Another surprising element is the seamless use of special
effects that come unexpectedly but perfectly convey what is
going on, such as Amelie melting into a puddle of water (trust
me, you'll understand when you see the movie).
Try out this movie. Remember to turn
on the English subtitles, and learn to enjoy the random occurrences
in life as well as the opportunities we all have to make things
a little better. And never pass over love just because you're
scared of the unknown. I think that's one of the huge things
to take from this story, and it's a worthwhile idea to grab
on to.
Scenes to Remember:
Amelie's revenge as a child; The walk with the Blind Man;
Mr. Collignon's bad day; A ride through Paris;
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