Amélie (2001) Reaction

I have always found that the French film industry has produced some of the greatest works of independent cinema in the past couple decades. So many talented filmmakers and performers have hailed from France, including the men who directed and wrote this film, Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Guillaume Laurant, respectively. The former of these two men was also part of the team behind the fabulously eccentric 1991 film Delicatessen, which I found to be very enjoyable. The stylistic touches of that film are certainly echoed here in Amélie, yet it is also somehow distinctly different. Maybe it is the free nature with which this film portrays sexuality, which seems almost too explicit for the average American viewer. This is a common theme amongst many foreign films, from many different countries, yet the French seem to be the most bold in this area of storytelling, from my own experiences in viewing foreign language films so far.

The style of shooting that this film utilizes is also extremely similar to Delicatessen, and perhaps that is due to the director, Jeunet, but it is very obvious that this these two very different films were directed by the same man. This is meant as a positive, as a distinct style is paramount almost to anything else if a filmmaker wishes to be remembered through their films. The director also utilizes some of the same performers in this film, including the protagonist from Delicatessen as a stalker pining after a woman who works in the same coffee shop as Amélie. Speaking of Amélie, the young woman who portrays the titular character in this film, Audrey Tautou, gives one of the best performances I have seen in a foreign language film, and one of the best performances I have ever seen in the genre of the romantic comedy. Although that is the most obvious genre which this film can be categorized within, the film also functions very well as a drama, as Amélie is not the happiest she can be at the beginning of the film, and that problem is what drives the film forward. If it is not already obvious, I very much enjoyed this film to an immense degree, and pretty much every aspect of this film is far above average. If you have not seen it, fix that, as this is one of the most well-known foreign language films ever made, and for good reason.