Amélie (2001)

You know, I constantly complain and bemoan the fact that movies I like are very tough to talk about, and even tougher to write about. I never know where to start, and when I finally get on a roll, it quickly turns into a mess of rambling, unfocused, most likely redundant gushing. It's so much easier to talk about why a movie doesn't work as opposed to talking about why a movie does work.

When a film is simply incompetent, or just full of dense stupid, it's easy. Ranting and raving and slathering like a dog over dumb crap and nitpicking plot-holes is just plain fun, I have to be honest. It's when you get movies where I can't really do that when I find myself at a loss for words.

But the hardest kind of movies to talk about are weird movies. Call them what you will, weird, quirky, different, unique, confusing, artsy, auteur, whenever a movie possesses a certain quality that simply boils down to "You really have to see it to get it" it's always excruciatingly hard to write about.

So long story short, my friends and I watched a French film directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet. Damn.

Check and mate.

  "Vive la France!"

"Amélie" is an absurdly unique film. It's unlike anything you've ever seen, especially if you haven't seen much foreign cinema. Not that being familiar with French movies will prepare you, necessarily, but it couldn't hurt. It's so efficient at carving out its own little world and transporting you to another place while being unbelievably and charmingly quirky that I'm not sure how many people would like it. And the worst part of it is that I'm not sure I possess the vocabulary to explain why. But I'll try my best.

The idea of "Amélie" is that it follows a young lady named Amélie, played in a frankly stunning performance by Audrey Tautou. She's a bit of an eccentric "free spirit," and almost comes across as an artsy proto-hipster in some ways. It's hard to explain but it wouldn't be hard to imagine her making clothing out of discarded drapery remnants or keeping a collection of toothpicks people threw out after eating their hors d'oeuvres, because it made her sad that they were only used for that one purpose. So she's walking that fine line between artsy and straight up weird. Then again, maybe it's just because she's French. It's hard to tell sometimes.

This is either the look of pure unadulterated innocence and wonderment, or the look of someone who will make an ascot out of your skin.

Amélie, after doing a good deed for someone, decides it is her mission in life to make other people happy, either through lending them a hand, fixing a problem they might have, or just playing matchmaker. And, since it is something of a romance as well, along the way she winds up finding love of her own.

I know, pretty cliched stuff. But that's really where the cliches end. It's not that the story of "Amélie" is honestly anything special, it's that the direction and look of the movie is. The best way to describe the way this movie goes down is to say that it's very aware that it is a movie. There is some serious forth-wall desecration going on here, to the point where Amélie will directly talk to the camera. Added to that is the constant narration which provides exposition, including telling us every character's likes and dislikes upon us first meeting them, and that's on top of dropping seemingly random nonsense on us.

Don't believe me? Here's the opening narration which are the first lines of the film:

"On September 3rd 1973, at 6:28pm and 32 seconds, a bluebottle fly capable of 14,670 wing beats a minute landed on Rue St Vincent, Montmartre. At the same moment, on a restaurant terrace nearby, the wind magically made two glasses dance unseen on a tablecloth. Meanwhile, in a 5th-floor flat, 28 Avenue Trudaine, Paris 9, returning from his best friend's funeral, Eugène Colère erased his name from his address book. At the same moment, a sperm with one X chromosome, belonging to Raphaël Poulain, made a dash for an egg in his wife Amandine. Nine months later, Amélie Poulain was born"

Quirkiness at maximum capacity - ERROR

I can't really explain the quirkiness of this film in any other way than just flat out transcribing it. And while that whole diatribe seems completely whacked and nutty, it actually works in context of the movie. Oh sure, I could sit and wax philosophical about how it ties in with the theme of seemingly random events and people coming together, sometimes through fate, accident or both, and how Amélie reflects that same concept in the sequences of events of the over-elaborate puzzles and hoops that she makes her love interest jump through due to her own shyness or fear, almost like she's running from destiny, but that would be pretentious. And possibly flat out wrong.

The important thing is that it does work when you view the movie as a whole, and the quirkiness adds to the charm of the film, which "Amélie" has in spades. In fact, it's so charming that even things that really probably shouldn't be that funny end up getting a chuckle. Whether it's two characters having a serious conversation while pricing and stocking dildos in a sex store, or Amélie's mother getting crushed to death by a rooftop jumper committing suicide, the level of humor ranges from somewhat low-brow to outright dark. But even those two extremes, once again, are smothered in so much whimsical charm that they always seem light-hearted.

I swear, I'm going to use the word "charm" so much in this entry that my C, H, A, R, and M keys are going to wear out.

As you may have been able to piece together, I enjoyed "Amélie." I'm glad I saw it. That being said, it's just such a weird film that I'm honestly not quite sure what I thought of it, if that makes any sense at all. If there were issues I took with it, they seem almost moot, because they have to do with plot. And to be honest I'm not sure how much something like plot is important to a movie like this.

I guess I'll just come out and say that my issues with it really boil down to the fact that it seems like Amélie started off with one plot and then halfway through moves on to another. The whole "helping everyone she meets" thing is dropped after about a half hour or so. After that the film really becomes about her pursuing this guy who she is crushing on, but since she is seemingly incapable of talking to the dude, she constructs these Rube Goldberg-esque plots to talk to him. Some of them come off as downright creepy, but again, it's hard to tell if she's a creep or just French.

But while these plans surprisingly work, she can never seem to follow up on them. And so back and forth we go between the two for a good hour of the film. These two are desperately trying to talk to each other the whole movie, but it just isn't happening for reasons that are infuriating to watch. Although to be fair, the payoff in the end is actually very well done, quite satisfying, and really cute.

 SO. ADORABLE.

There's also this thing with her pranking this really mean guy at a vegetable stand by busting in his apartment constantly and doing all kinds of nefarious things. Most of them are relatively harmless but one in particular moves into the "you could potentially kill this individual" territory. That whole thing about helping people started ringing a tad hollow at that point, I'm just saying.

But like I said, all of that is moot. With a movie with a style like this, sometimes I'm not even sure if the plot is important at all. It's just an overall feeling that you get from a movie like this, and I'm guessing that most people would come away from "Amélie" with a smile on their face. Who cares if it made a whole lot of sense? With as quirky as this movie is, not making sense is almost expected.

THE BOTTOM LINE - I'm not sure what the point of "Amélie" is, but it was a cool little movie. I think it's one of those "you take out what you put in" films that could have various meanings depending on who was watching it. While I'm not sure if I was a huge fan of it or not, it was definitely worth my time, and I'd suggest everyone watch it if they had the opportunity. That is, if you're ready for some charming French quirkiness. Highly Recommended.