Aug. 8, 2005 - 11:36 am
well, after seeing and loving some of director Jean-Pierre Jeunet's other films such as Am�lie (2001) and The City of Lost Children (1995), Jill and i really wanted to see this one. i think Colin had seen it when it first came out, but other than that i didn't ever really hear that much about this one. there was the whole thing where it wasn't allowed into the Cannes festival, but other than that i was at a loss.
this is a story of two teenagers in love in the French countryside during WWI. unfortunately the young man is carted off to the war and is presumed dead after he is basically executed by being put out in front of the German trenches. the young girl, played by Audrey Tautou, goes on a hunt to find out what really happened. it's basically a detective story and not so much about the romance.
frankly, Jill and i were a bit bored with this i think. i likened it to that scene in Amadeus (1984) where the emperor tells Mozart that his opera was quite good but simply had "too many notes." there are too many characters in this film that are not well developed, the scenes are unnecessarily fast and things move back and forth through time too much. it's hard to find something solid to hold on to. we can only hope that Jeunet's next movie is a bit more solid like some of his earlier work.