Delicatessen (1991)
Aug. 20th, 2005 09:10 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
randy_byersAs I mentioned yesterday, I picked up the DVD of Delicatessen in the UK, because it isn't available in the US. Last night I watched it, and it was the first time I'd seen the movie since I saw it in the theater in 1992. I've always remembered it with great fondness, although the only sequence I could really remember was the one where everyone in the apartment building gets swept up in the rhythm of the humping couple on the squeaky bedsprings.
I've been a huge fan of director Jean-Pierre Jeunet ever since, particularly of La Cité des enfants perdus/The City of Lost Children (1995) and Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain/Amelie (2001). I haven't seen Alien: Resurrection (1997), which Jeunet has pretty much disavowed, and I wasn't sure what I thought of Un long dimanche de fiançailles/A Very Long Engagement, which just came out last year. I need to see it again. Definitely the usual visual feast and a very complex -- or at least compound -- story.
Anyway, I've been pining to see Delicatessen again for years, and it didn't disappoint. I recognized some of the cast from other Jeunet movies -- Dominique Pinon has been in every one; the guy who plays the butcher was the opiated assassin in City of Lost Children; the guy who plays the lovelorn Robert played Amelie's father. The genre is the post-apocalyptic comedy of cannibalism. It is grotesque and absurd, bizarre and uproarious. It contains a sweet romance, and a large troupe of vivid characters with their own agendas. The production design, by Marc Caro (who also co-directed), is baroque and expressionist, full of strange, Rube Goldbergian, Terry Gilliamesque devices, not to mention the necessary frogs and snails.
It isn't as good as City of Lost Children, which Jeunet also made with Caro. The plot recomplications start to flag in the end (or perhaps just get less interesting as they resolve), and the romance isn't quite twisted enough to fit the setting (despite involving that living gargoyle, Pinon). But the pungent characters, bizarre imagery, and surreal, satiric humor create a unique and fascinating world. Thank god the Brits aren't afraid to put a good French movie on disk!
I've been a huge fan of director Jean-Pierre Jeunet ever since, particularly of La Cité des enfants perdus/The City of Lost Children (1995) and Le Fabuleux destin d'Amélie Poulain/Amelie (2001). I haven't seen Alien: Resurrection (1997), which Jeunet has pretty much disavowed, and I wasn't sure what I thought of Un long dimanche de fiançailles/A Very Long Engagement, which just came out last year. I need to see it again. Definitely the usual visual feast and a very complex -- or at least compound -- story.
Anyway, I've been pining to see Delicatessen again for years, and it didn't disappoint. I recognized some of the cast from other Jeunet movies -- Dominique Pinon has been in every one; the guy who plays the butcher was the opiated assassin in City of Lost Children; the guy who plays the lovelorn Robert played Amelie's father. The genre is the post-apocalyptic comedy of cannibalism. It is grotesque and absurd, bizarre and uproarious. It contains a sweet romance, and a large troupe of vivid characters with their own agendas. The production design, by Marc Caro (who also co-directed), is baroque and expressionist, full of strange, Rube Goldbergian, Terry Gilliamesque devices, not to mention the necessary frogs and snails.
It isn't as good as City of Lost Children, which Jeunet also made with Caro. The plot recomplications start to flag in the end (or perhaps just get less interesting as they resolve), and the romance isn't quite twisted enough to fit the setting (despite involving that living gargoyle, Pinon). But the pungent characters, bizarre imagery, and surreal, satiric humor create a unique and fascinating world. Thank god the Brits aren't afraid to put a good French movie on disk!
