Amélie

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I just watched Amélie with Diane and I came to the following three conclusions.

  1. They totally ripped off the music from Platoon for one of the TV sequences near the beginning
  2. Those damn Expedia commercials with the travelling garden gnome are a reference to this movie…
  3. I want to light Amélie on fire and kick her down a flight of stairs.

Okay, actually that piece turns out to be “Adagio for Strings” by Samuel Barber. But back to the point:

Major French overload. There is something really annoying about how precious and intentionally quirky everyone is. It reminds me of high school drama kids. Most of these problems can be solved by issuing a savage beating to everyone involved.

The cinematography: Every scene is very green and red. Maybe I should buy a bunch of filters for my camera now. And every shot is like a panel in a comic book- follow the motion, follow the motion, now we highlight a single item. You know another director who does this? Sam Raimi. Watch Amélie and then The Quick And The Dead right after each other. Maybe you will notice the similar style. Except Raimi is trying to make it cartoony.

Also, I thought it was just Luc Besson’s sick fixation, but it appears that the French like the women who look like little girls, who are shy and uptight and introverted, innocent and clueless yet somehow simultaneously full of raging passion. Either that or French women really are like that.

It’s her constantly pursed lips. Makes me want to put a brick through her face.

BRIAN: If you could boil any one person in the Two Windmills Café alive, who would it be?
DIANE: All of them.
BRIAN: You only get one.
DIANE: Amélie. Because then this movie would be over.

4 thoughts on “Amélie”

  1. This is so funny, everybody thing that film is great! I quite like that but I need to see one more time to get your point.

  2. the design/colour/cinematography in amelie were extremly intentional, and yes, meant to be surreal/cartoony…

  3. ok who ever wrot that little rant about amelie being too French, should peel his ignorant american ass off the couch and go see the world, youre nothing but a culturaly infentile motherfucker representing a culturaly infentile society. discrediting the color schemes of the film as just filters, shows your total disregard for any photographic or cinematographic values. youd best shut your mouth before emberassing yourself further, and in all fairness reading your post made me want to put a brick through your feeble opinionated head. go vote for bush you dumb fuck and leave artistic mediums for artists.

  4. You sir, are a foolio.

    “Whoever wrote” this? It’s MY BLOG you dolt. I don’t “represent” America any more or less than you do. And your insane vitriol is why conservatives write us off as a bunch of liberal flakes. That’s right, “us.” If you bothered to read the rest of my site you’d see all the liberal propaganda plastered all over it.

    Art appreciation has very little to do with politics. Some of the world’s greatest art collectors are serious asshole bankers who always vote money, which these days means voting Republican. The greatest artists of the Renaissance worked under rich patrons, who if they were alive today, sure as hell wouldn’t be liberals. It’s the money, son.

    Your righteous anger vs xenophobia is commendable, just completely misplaced. Go surf MoveOn.org and find something constructive to be angry about. Or go buy NOFX’s album.

    Plus, since I’m on a roll now… it’s very likely I have travelled about ten times as much as you. I’ve been to France, Italy, Iceland, Japan, Hong Kong, Thailand, and about a dozen other countries. I have close friends in Japan, Switzerland, and England.

    You will note that I’m remarking mainly on the story and its “preciousness,” not that it is “too French.” I made a similar critique about David Mamet’s films, and he is not French… hm actually, Mamet is a French name, isn’t it. Maybe he is a “Franco-American”… Anyway, have you seen any of Luc Besson’s movies? If you can’t see the character similarity you just aren’t looking hard enough.

    Also, I am really into movies. Yes, I know the color scheme is intentional. Do you know the name of the Brazilian painter it is based on? I do. I’m learning about color values in film for my own film work; it’s not easy. But you know what IS easy? Self-styling yourself as an “artist” and insisting non-artists cannot form their own opinions about art.

    Also, try using a spellchecker mmmkay.

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