Micmacs is the newest movie by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and stars Dany Boon, Dominique Pinon and Yolande Moreau.
Plot:
When Bazil (Dany Boon) is a little boy, his father is killed by a landmine. Years later, Bazil remained an underachiever, works in a videostore where he watches old movies the whole day. One day, he gets shot in the head by a stray bullet. He survives, but the bullet remains in his head and he could drop dead any second. When he gets out of the hospital, he has lost his flat and his job. For a while, he tries to get by by being a street artist until he is kind of adopted by a random bunch of outcasts. One day, he drives past the company which produced the landmine that killed his father, which happens to be right across the street from the company which produced the bullet in his head and he decides to take revenge.
Jeunet is a wonderful film maker with a great visual style. That’s also the case here. Unfortunately, it all gets a little too much, especially the whimsy factor is much too high.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet movies are most charming, usually. Their visuals are wonderful (and heavily orchestrated), their characters an arbitrary bunch of sweet social misfits, their plots fantastic but not impossible. And all the same puzzle pieces are in place here, but somehow they won’t fit together. Instead of enjoying the whimsy, I got annoyed and in the end bored.
I think the problem was the sheer density of weirdness. Because everything else was great. Dany Boon is the perfect cast; his overacting rubber-facedness fits the film perfectly. The whole cast was great, even though it was a little sad to see so little of Yolande Moreau.
The visuals were wonderful. I loved how everywhere in the film there were posters of the film, I loved the costume design, I loved the general visual atmosphere that was at the same time very distinctively Jeunet and something new entirely.
But the silliness just got to me. I just noticed how with every passing minute, I was less engaged in the film. I didn’t care anymore about the story or the characters, the romance just happens because it has to happen, there’s no real emotion behind it and I just wanted to to be over about halfway through. [This might sound harsher than it actually was. I wasn’t watching in pain or anything.]
It’s a miss, but still watchable.
kalafudra's Stuff 
Ah, Jeunet! I wasn’t aware that he had a new film out. This one sounds like it possibly might be more along the lines of his earlier stuff, City of the Lost Children or Delicatessen (mixed feelings on the former, liked the latter). Especially City of the Lost Children seemed uneven to me. From the group shot photo you posted at the end, I can recognize some Jeunet regulars, like Dominique Pinon.
I haven’t seen either City of the Lost Children nor Delicatessen, [I know, I know, bad cineast. ;)] so I can’t really say. But Micmacs is definitely not very much like Amelie and even less like Mathilde.
Both films are worthwhile. The young female lead in City of the Lost Children is a strong draw, even if I thought other aspects weren’t as good. A few years ago, when I was more active on film forums than book blogs, I set myself up to watch a ton of French films, so I’m lopsidedly familiar with that country’s films.
I put both films on my to watch list.
In Austria, we get surprisingly many French films, too. But both Delicatessen as well as City of Lost Children were before my time as diverse movie-goer.
[…] looks a lot like Micmacs – I guess Jeunet started early with the kinda-monochromatic/goldish look. Generally I was […]