Amelie

Rating:
Summary: Delightful!
Review: Amelie is a charming film. The actress, Audrey Tautou, does a beautiful job expressing emotion nonverbally. I have seen it twice and enjoyed it just as much the second time. The music goes along nicely with the film. This is a light, fun film that will leave you with a smile on your face and a warm glow in your heart!

Rating:
Summary: A witty fairy tale
Review: I really enjoyed the film. Witty, clever, at time surprising. I definetely recommend it for an evening of fun.
I was pleased of the the added bonus of being R rated (in USA), which would prevent too many young girls from seeing it unsupervised. Why? It is a tale with what I call: "the Beauty and the Beast syndrome" a.k.a. "a goody goody girl needs to save beastly men to find happiness and fulfilment". In this particular film there is a touch of "SnowWhite and the 7 dwarfs": Amelie actually meddles with 7 diminutive (or somewhat damaged) male subjects, not to mention the garden gnome.
Am I cynical? yes, but films carry messages, and very strong one too. No wonder so many male viewers fell in love with Amelie: she is a modern century heroine, whose kind are hard to come by in time of equality and political correctness.
Keep dreaming, but still see the film for the clever laugh.

Rating:
Summary: Paris magic!
Review: This was a sweet, charming, funny movie. If you've seen Delicatessen. you'll recognize the colors and quirky humor. Aimelie finds an old tin of treasures from a boy who lived in her apartment years ago. This leads her on an odyssey of meddling into the lives of those around her. She surreptitiously makes the woman at the tobacco stand and a regular at the restaurant where she works aware of one another's charms. She manages to maneuver them into a tryst in the bathroom and, like Delicatessen, the earth moves for more than just the lovers. The mischef she dishes out to the vegetable vendor on the corner is wonderfully clever. Her biggest challange is to overcom her own shyness and apply the special magic she is spreading around Paris to her own life. For two hours of sheer delight, this movie can't be beat!

Rating:
Summary: Elle va changer ta vie!
Review: I am far from an expert on French film. But as an AP french student, I have seen the eccentric, the subtle, the whimsical, the heroic, the tender, and the callous side of French cinema in films like My Life in Pink, My Mother's Castle, and The Horseman on the Roof. So there, I went to Amelie with some expectations from those past experiences. But actually, many raving reviews received before the film was even released in the US gave my impatience the needed extra push.

The story is about a Parisian girl named Amelie (a wide-eyed elfish/nymph like Audrey Touton) who grows up to become a heroine bigger than the aimless life she seemed destined to lead. Having discovered the joy of charity and creating miracles for all those around her, Amelie is at last ready for some miracles performed for her. And enters Nino, an unlikely Prince Charming, whose boyish chagrin adds an extra charm to the already light-hearted film. The whole cast is amazing as one eccentric character after another is introduced and subtly pricks the audience's bourgeoisie/mainstream taste and conscience. The pace is delightful as director Jean-Pierre Jeunet moves his camera through the streets of a dream-like Paris. Everything seems perfect in Jeunet's world as the colors of clothing and the mood, the atmosphere, the music coalesce to contrast the emotional edges that chafe inside all of us. Amelie is determined to change everyone's live by scraping off those edges, and by the end of the film, I myself was ready to doubt the feasibility of unhappiness.

So how is Amelie the film French? Like a sophiscated, artsy informercial, Amelie possesses a light, springy, optimistic tone that easily seduces the audience into believing there is beauty in the world and poetry in even the most banal occurrences. But Amelie the film is also universal, especially now. Because without the heavy grandiosity (so prevalent in escapist films of the war and patriotic genre), Amelie speaks to the heart, and unleashes another form of heroism ~ the most unobtrusive kind.

Rating:
Summary: Amelie WILL change your life
Review: Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the brilliant director behind "Delicatessen," "City of Lost Children" and "Alien: Resurrection" comes back in 2001 with a fable that's as close to reality as you'd ever want it to be. "Amelie," also known in French as "The fabulous destiny of Amelie Poulain" takes place in Paris, the city where an innocent and angel-like girl grows to become a good-doer, much in a style similar to the movie "Pay it forward" from 2000. However the storyline is totally unconventional, filled with her daydreaming depicted in very original and fun ways, and with unexpected turns as she goes about her good deeds. At one point she finds herself caught in pursuing what's best for others, while being afraid to pursue happiness for herself.

In times of uncertainty and was such as these, where everyone is in dire need of a positive message, this movie is it. You will love this movie, and as its poster reads "she'll change your life."

Rating:
Summary: Jenuet makes a parody of Hitchcok's films
Review: The laughter behind Claude Perrons beautiful face is taken from Hitchcoks "To Catch A thief" and the plot is a parody of "Rare Window". Thera is also a pile of refferings to Indiana Jones and other Spielbergs movies.
Three cheat-cuts:
1)When Amelie spots that Dufayel and she have the same meal and when she begins to feel sorry for herself and her father, and when she turns to the kitchen table, the paste is cold in another cut, and cheese mill is an onther position.
2) Whe Nino runs down the Carrussel park, he runs into a couple, but in the next cut they ar nowhere.
3)Let's talk aboult third cut.
But I am saying all this only because I'm film freak, and I couldn't refrain myself analyzing.
In fact I am in love with this film. I watched it 52 times.
Delighted by sound mixage and photography, as well as by editing.
Amazed by rewievs that reproach lenghtsimple-maindedness and naivitet...
Ready to discuss film further: lets comaper ours shoting books, if yu remeber the film and know it by heart as I do.
[e-mail]
Only a beginning of my rewiev

Rating:
Summary: What else can I say about Amelie...
Review: except that this movie was FANTASTIC!!!! One of the best movies I have ever see!! Would recommend this movie to anyone with a good, light-hearted attituded!!

Rating:
Summary: wonderfully vivid
Review: Extremely wonderful or beautiful things often leave me struggling for words. That was how I felt about this movie. Leaving the theater, I was still completely lost in the world that Jean-Pierre Jeunet created. Why would I want to leave when everything was so perfect and silly and beautiful there? It's been a while since a movie has made me feel so good about the world and life in general. This movie did that because of its simple beauty and strangeness, and I left the theater with a sense of gratitude. I am not ashamed to admit that I love (need?) a happy ending every once in a while.

There were two narrative techniques which I found especially endearing. The first was the idea of setting up a scene or event by telling the audience about several completely unrelated and sometimes insignificant things that were happening simultaneously. The second was introducing the characters by listing a few of their idiosyncratic likes and dislikes. This was a wonderful and different way to develop the characters-it made me feel strongly for each of them immediately.

Amelie is an unabashedly strange girl with an un-self-conscious smile and an amazing imaginary life. The movie begins with her tragic childhood with self-absorbed, neurotic parents and no friends. Amelie is forced to rely on her imagination for entertainment, companionship, and other things that a young girl needs in growing up. However, she raises herself well and becomes a self-sufficient, quirky, good-hearted (if a little socially isolated) 23-year-old. This is where we meet her next, working as a waitress and following her odd little passions. A random discovery leads her to try to fix everyone's life around her, both through good deeds and petty vengeances. Even as she is absorbed in this mission, she is slowly moving toward fixing her own life. The series of events that fill the middle section of the movie are wild, funny, touching and revealing.

I found this movie entirely likable (though I admit to a penchant for quirkiness). I also found the whole movie visually appealing. Audrey Tautou is beautiful as Amelie, every scene is full of vivid color and detail, and all the characters have extremely interesting faces and personalities. I highly recommend "Amelie" to anyone looking for a light-hearted, feel-good, change-your-perspective kind of movie...

Rating:
Summary: MISS ADVENTURE
Review: I WASN'T SURE WHAT I WAS ABOUT TO WATCH BUT AS IT PLAYED, I BEGAN TO LIKE IT A LOT AS THE MOVIE WENT ON. AMELIE WAS VERY FUNNY IN MANY DIFFERENT WAYS. I'M SURE EVERYONE THATS SEES THIS MOVIE WILL GET A REAL LAUGH OUT OF IT.

Rating:
Summary: A Mainstream Hit Dipped In Euro-Sauciness!
Review: The lack of any decent films from the English lingo countries of England and America has given rise to an increase in recognition of some of the finer foreign language exploits into cinema. Earlier this year we had "Amores Perros", and in England we had Japanese shock-fests "Audition" and "Battle Royale" (the latter has to be seen to be believed). The most successful foreign language film this year, bar "Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon" obviously, was this French trifle that whilst appealing to the fickle tastes of mainstream audiences superbly serves up its romantic hokiness in a touching and cute way. Over-hyped, to be sure, but not without its pleasures.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet's "The City Of Lost Children", which he co-directed with Marc Caro, bears the most resemblance to the look of "Amelie", which looks different to any other film this year with all of its rich, antique-looking cinematography as well as its inclusion of several effects shots that help to render Paris as paradise on Earth. Visual coups include Amelie herself collapsing to the ground as a puddle of water and the titular garden gnome that travels the world much to the chagrin of its owner, Amelie's father. Everything smacks of resplendence in this movie and no cinematic trick is left not utilised.

In all respects, "Amelie" is likely to play better in America than it should in Europe, where its cute benevolence will be welcomed by many, especially after September 11. If you are one of those people who can't help but giggle as bug-eyed little girls stare into the camera with a cheeky smile, then this film is for you (indeed, Audrey Tautou is bug-eyed, cheeky and very good in the title role). If you are like those who criticised "Amelie" for its lack of interracial characters, then don't bother: this beguiling trifle is a fantasy, pure and simple, like "Amelie" herself.