Published at: May 20, 2001, 10:39 p.m. CST by headgeek
When I accepted the New Line junket to Cannes I was going not to see the LORD OF THE RINGS footage… In New Zealand, I had seen enough to be convinced till this coming December that the film was indeed most righteous in its coolness. No, I accepted the trip because I knew if I went, I could finagle a way to see Jeunet’s AMELIE…
I had read Edgard’s review, I’ve been reading the murmur of perfection from all the reports of EuroAICN… I had read that Miramax acquired the United States rights of distribution to the film… I’m not really afraid of Miramax changing it, because generally they treat foreign language films from Europe with a respect that they don’t extend to the Asian cinema market… BUT… there’s always a chance… I wanted to see this film, with subtitles or without… but I wanted to see it pure.
Dr Sotha and I arrived at the theater quite early. We met an angel from GLAMOUR magazine and Ebert’s wife Chaz out front… Then we hiked up the Exorcist like stairs to the OLYMPIA 1 screening room.
This was a ‘critic’ screening, as we walked in Press Notes were handed out, but I didn’t want to read a thing… I wanted to watch the film. I wanted this screening room dark, and the screen lit… This was the film I traveled halfway round the world to see early.
God I love it when the buzz is right. I love it when the eyes and ears of our fellow AICN-ers are dead on right. Edgard called this film perfect and PERFECT it is.
Imagine if Billy Wilder had written MAGNOLIA starring Audrey Hepburn and the cast of DELICATESSEN and shot with the beauty of BABE, but the soul of RAISING ARIZONA.
The movie is a tale of chances and changes, tiny changes that make all the difference. It is a love story, but not just between a girl and boy, but between a woman and life itself.
I love Jeunet’s other two films, DELICATESSEN and CITY OF LOST CHILDREN (ALIEN RESSURECTION never happened in my eyes now). However, this is… beyond any doubt for me, his best overall film.
How?
Well, watching this film… I can say that for the very first time, the amazing visual flourishes don’t distract from the tale. For example, as great as the bed spring scene was in DELICATESSEN, it was as if the entire film had to stop for that sequence. Or in CITY OF LOST CHILDREN, the teardrop that changed the world…. I love it, it’s brilliant, but it also called a halt to the forward momentum of the film, all for the purpose of delivering what basically amounted to a brilliant gag. Here… Here we have all the glory of that style of brilliant cinematic strokes of genius, but each and every single time it advances the story and the narrative and transformation of this stunning beautiful transcendent goddess… AMELIE…
Oh, to live in her world. To be taken by the arm and escorted to a subway entrance and be blind. To have my shoes altered by her. To have mysterious video tape compilations left upon my doorstep by her… AMELIE… where are you?
To add to the symphony of orgasms in her Paris… To leave my torn passport photos gathered for her in an anonymous book. To live in a world with the traveling gnome and to work in a sex shop one day and to be a ghoul on Wednesday.
I want to spy on an ex-girlfriend. To be an unpublished romantic author. A sickly cigarette counter girl. A belligerent seller of vegetables. A brittle boned painter of a thousand same images. I want to be the mysterious photo ghost. I want to be there to mop up her waterfall of tears.
For all of you who have not seen this film, that have yet to experience its magic… For all that assume that none of this makes sense, that it can’t come together, that there is no plot surrounding Amelie’s fragile murmuring heart… Believe… have faith…
If this film were to come out on New Year’s Eve of this year… and if between now and then every film blew… This year would be a triumph, because we have AMELIE.
I do love it so. This is a film that makes you hug your popcorn bucket and purse your smiling lips around the straw and draw in slowly with tear drenched eyes and dimpled cheeks.
A film that cures cynicism and makes the world all better. I have to say… walking from the theater with Dr Sotha was wrong, so instead I left with the wunderlady from Glamour who showed me to the Croissette… once there I was left alone with my thoughts. The beach on one side of me, the hotels with mobs of celeb-watchers on the other. I walked laughing to myself, smiling extra large… Oh what a joy life can be… AMELIE makes you feel that way… Makes you fill up with good and do unto others as Amelie would.
Now I know what you are thinking… "Harry’s exaggerating" Ahem… Go to IMDB and look the film up… You’ll notice the 410 votes and the 9.3 rating average… Go browse through their USER FEEDBACK area… Notice the pure joy. The celebration of the cinematic experience in their words. This one… This one you will see and cry tears of joy for seeing. This one is a beauty of perfection. This one… This one we watch for years to come, and each time… you smile just a bit wider. You’ll see a perfect film when you see AMELIE…
