Playtime

Bumbling Mr. Hulot (Jacques Tati) meanders around a modern, lifeless Paris, encountering tourists, locals, and other mirrors of himself at an office building and a trade show. Tati's Playtime is an impressive concoction, with expansive set pieces that play out like an ever evolving Rube Goldberg machine but is meandering and self-indulgent, similar to sentiments I had toward his equally regarded Mon Oncle. Again, the canvas is spectacular and easy to get lost in but it seems that the prevailing attitude is that composition is enough to hold viewer interest, and if that is the case, what essentially separates this from a Michael Bay movie?

*** out of ****

Mon Oncle

While staying at his sister's post-modernistic suburban home, Mr. Hulot (Jacques Tati) takes on all the pointless gadgetry and lifeless architecture while mentoring his nephew. Where Tati's M. Hulot's Holiday was breezy and affable this much admired follow-up is a meandering, tiresome, overlong obvious satire with few laughs but many good sight gags. The set design and photography are impeccable.

** 1/2 out of ****

Mr. Hulot's Holiday

Here the title sufficiently sums up the plot: the clumsy, gangly, and kindly man takes his sabbatical in a French resort town where he wreaks havoc on the vacationing inhabitants. Jacques Tati's subtle, nearly silent observational comedy, in which he wrote, starred, and directed, introduced his Mr. Hulot character to the masses which simultaneously serves as a critique of the upper class, an homage to the silent comics, and a funny and breezy postcard. Although it would seem like this has gone largely unseen today, it still has served as an inspiration to many of today's comedians. I was in a foul mood when I watched this recently and was initially frustrated with its pacing. As it progressed, I was quickly placed under its spell as I was whisked away on Mr. Hulot's enchanting, picaresque vacation.
*** 1/2 out of ****

The Illusionist

The Illusionist comes from two brilliant French minds. The first is Sylvain Chomet and his animation studio who previously brought The Triplets of Belleville to the screen. The second is the late Jacques Tati, the director and star of the Mr. Hulot and others, whose script Chomet works from. The story takes place in 1959 and revolves around a failing magician in Paris who is forced to retreat to London, where he again fails to find an audience, losing them to the latest influx of rock musicians. He once again departs for Edinburgh, Scotland and on his first night in a small rural town outside of the city, he finds the audience in a local bar to love him. He soon draws the affections of a young girl, who stows away in the train to Edinburgh when he goes there to perform. What follows, specifically the details of their plutonic relationship, is bittersweet. Many of the elements reminded me of Mr. Hulot's Holiday. The magician is a Hulot-like character, tall, lanky, and clumsy. There are also some nice slapstick elements, which Tati was a master of. Finally, the bittersweet nature of the story is also indicative of Tati. Chomet also recreates the charm and the oddness of his previous feature. Again, we have almost no spoken dialogue, just occasionally some grumbling and a few words. The story moves at a languid pace, but the hand drawn animation is excellent and serves as a reminder that not all animated movies need to be made with a computer or seen with dark 3D glasses.

*** out of ****