"That's a nice-a donut."

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

A Very Long Engagement (2004)

With A Very Long Engagement Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the director of such films as Delicatessen, The City of Lost Children, the regrettable Alien: Resurrection, and the recent classic Amelie, has created a stirring work. This is a story of love, love lost, and hope for love again that may (or may not) come true.

Mathilde (Audrey Tautou) is a very determined and optimistic young woman in 1920 France, who has been anxiously waiting to hear good word on the fate of her fiance Manech (Gaspard Ulliel), who has been missing but presumed dead since a battle three years before during World War I (of course, it was not called that at the time). He had actually been court-martialed prior to this, along with four other men, and was sent out to die in no man's land. But Mathilde would just know if something had happened to him, so she holds out hope that she will be with him again. She hires an investigator to find clues as to what really happened that fateful day, and also begins to piece things together herself. Along the way, she meets several comrades who Maneche met, or who knew people that he met (including Jodie Foster in a short, but strong supporting role), on his fateful tour and experiences several highs and lows.

Mathilde is sometimes rather childish in her superstitious ways. For example in one scene she tells herself that if the train enters the tunnel or the ticket taker comes to take her ticket before she counts to 7, then Manech is still alive. Her hope becomes our hope though, as we our lost in Jeunet's world.

One amazing thing about the movie is that it seamlessly merges several very distinct genres of film; romance, war, mystery, and comedy, as well as being a period study of post-war France. The war scenes are short, and not the main focus of the plot, but are well filmed and good for what they are. It is very interesting to see different cinematic takes on the "War to End All Wars" given that, for some reason, there have been relatively few WWI movies. It is in the other aspects, where it really excels though - as a romance and light-hearted mystery.

A Very Long Engagement is a very visual presentation. Color is very important here, as there is heavy use of tan, yellow, and brown tones, with some darker greens and blues in certain places. And many of the images are perfectly shot; oftentimes good camera work in a movie can be established by a simple test: does a single frame tell a story or have any artistic value when it is paused? In that regard, the movie richly deserved its acclaim and Academy Award nomination for cinematography (for which it should have won).

The overall editing and sense of style is wonderful. Jeunet made heavy use of flashbacks, and even sometimes overlayed them onto the present-day scenes. The quick cuts are used to tell brief stories about the characters. And some of them are repeated and scenes are played over again - sometimes from different perspectives - as the past becomes very important to Mathilde's story and to her well-being. Tautou is just right for the part; she plays a similar sort of character as the free-spirit Amelie, but with even more depth and emotion.

My one real complaint is that the story gets a little complex. It is very taxing trying to keep up with all of the soldier's and other people's names, and their relationships to one other. This is a good thing in one respect, because you know you aren't getting a juvenile teen romance with outrageous hijinks and fart jokes (well, actually that latter one isn't true because there are in fact a couple humorous fart jokes, but I digress). On the other hand, it is mildly distracting from the other great things, trying to play along as a detective. This is just a minor issue though, and one that would certainly be less of a factor with further viewings. Some people may be disappointed by the ending, others may find it to be the perfect denouement, though I was somewhere in the middle. Either way, it is a very fulfilling story.

The Verdict: A-.

Michael Bentley 11:39 AM

"That's a nice-a donut."

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Archives