Magritte, the movie. Very, very special indeed.
This is an intellectual comedy - certainly not as much slapstick as, say, Mon Oncle. The structure is fugal, intercutting between two visitors to Paris (M. Hulot, who has come for a business meeting, and a young tourist named Barbara). After glimpsing each other several times, finally they meet, and he discovers she is married. It's a Picaresque comedy, in other words: 'journeys end in lovers meeting'. In fact, it's a true epic in every sense...
On their journey, Hulot and Barbara run into - the greatest ensemble of bit part actors you will ever see anywhere. Compare this with 'It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World' - fifty celebrities given no material, and screaming at each other for three hours. Here, fifty nobodies are given the best jokes, and all the screen-time they need to deliver hilarious performances. And largely without dialogue.
The tempo is impeccable and slow - at least until the great set-piece restaurant sequence at the end (which from a technical standpoint is one of the most exhausting pieces of ensemble comedy you will ever see).
It's really rare in a movie to see individual funny shots. Not so much the "lubitsch touches" using cutaways, but, rather individual images that are funny or grotesque in themselves. Some of the compositions and angles simply make me laugh out loud. There are also sound gags.
The huge Tativille sets are an hilarious parody of the 'International style', and so much of the humour comes from the human inability to live up to our sleek, glamorous surroundings. The characters are just delightful - the self-made German businessman desperately selling doors you can slam 'in total silence'; Hulot's old war-buddy; the elderly concierge with the cigar; the nuns; the Yank with the Benzedrine inhalor...
The Party Line on this movie is that it's "anti-technology". Personally, I find it to be intensely worldly: a film made by someone who loves the world, and enjoys the bizarre interaction between human beings and their things. There's no malice in it, no villains; it's not a nightmare at all (like, say, 'Brazil'). Ultimately, it's just a little wistful. Hulot is a gauche loser who knows he's a gauche loser. Barbara - well, what is it with Tati and these sad, lonesome, slightly mysterious leading ladies? They're as interesting in their own way as Hitchcock's blondes...
Finally, a plug for this if you like epics. Epic comedies are a suspect genre; in some ways, it's all been downhill since "The General" and "Steamboat Bill Jr.". But, love it or hate it, you can see every franc in this film; quite apart from the sets and costumes, the rehearsals and set-ups are exhaustive. As a piece of technique, it's breathtaking on every front.
The weird thing is that, as with Chaplin and Keaton, only an insane control-freak could have made this gentle, lovable movie.
This is an intellectual comedy - certainly not as much slapstick as, say, Mon Oncle. The structure is fugal, intercutting between two visitors to Paris (M. Hulot, who has come for a business meeting, and a young tourist named Barbara). After glimpsing each other several times, finally they meet, and he discovers she is married. It's a Picaresque comedy, in other words: 'journeys end in lovers meeting'. In fact, it's a true epic in every sense...
On their journey, Hulot and Barbara run into - the greatest ensemble of bit part actors you will ever see anywhere. Compare this with 'It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World' - fifty celebrities given no material, and screaming at each other for three hours. Here, fifty nobodies are given the best jokes, and all the screen-time they need to deliver hilarious performances. And largely without dialogue.
The tempo is impeccable and slow - at least until the great set-piece restaurant sequence at the end (which from a technical standpoint is one of the most exhausting pieces of ensemble comedy you will ever see).
It's really rare in a movie to see individual funny shots. Not so much the "lubitsch touches" using cutaways, but, rather individual images that are funny or grotesque in themselves. Some of the compositions and angles simply make me laugh out loud. There are also sound gags.
The huge Tativille sets are an hilarious parody of the 'International style', and so much of the humour comes from the human inability to live up to our sleek, glamorous surroundings. The characters are just delightful - the self-made German businessman desperately selling doors you can slam 'in total silence'; Hulot's old war-buddy; the elderly concierge with the cigar; the nuns; the Yank with the Benzedrine inhalor...
The Party Line on this movie is that it's "anti-technology". Personally, I find it to be intensely worldly: a film made by someone who loves the world, and enjoys the bizarre interaction between human beings and their things. There's no malice in it, no villains; it's not a nightmare at all (like, say, 'Brazil'). Ultimately, it's just a little wistful. Hulot is a gauche loser who knows he's a gauche loser. Barbara - well, what is it with Tati and these sad, lonesome, slightly mysterious leading ladies? They're as interesting in their own way as Hitchcock's blondes...
Finally, a plug for this if you like epics. Epic comedies are a suspect genre; in some ways, it's all been downhill since "The General" and "Steamboat Bill Jr.". But, love it or hate it, you can see every franc in this film; quite apart from the sets and costumes, the rehearsals and set-ups are exhaustive. As a piece of technique, it's breathtaking on every front.
The weird thing is that, as with Chaplin and Keaton, only an insane control-freak could have made this gentle, lovable movie.