Lately it's been a bit of a coincidence, but many movies that I watched for the first time or caught my attention the second time have been movies set in France. The directors come from various countries; America, Australia, France itself. Maybe for it's reputation as a romantic country, it lends a good background for cultural beauty or an opportunity to let your imagination run wild (although most people say fantasy and reality are 2 very different things, Japanese people even have a proper named disease for the culture shock they get when they tour France and find out that it's just as dirty and vulgar as every other country in the world-Paris syndrome)

OK, back to the main story, lets have a little collection of France-set movies, shall we?

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First up, Moulin Rouge! (yes, the title has an apostrophe in it)

I had to watch this movie I think 7 times a few terms ago, for research purposes. But I wouldn't mind watching it again. Directed by Baz Luhrmann, calling it lavish would be an understatement. The costumes and set design scream for attention in Art Noveau meets cabaret style. The soundtracks are famous for their combination of lots of popular songs to create new ones. If you've watched the movie, one of the words that could describe it best is:random. But unusually, this is a good thing. Maybe one of the things we need in cinema is some novelty. Moulin Rouge won 2 Oscars, one for Costume design and another for Art Direction.

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The next one up is Silk. I think this one has gone under the radar, or, I dunno...banned in Malaysia? But eventhough it starts Keira Knightly, I didn't know of it's existance until a few weeks ago. Actually it's set in both France and Japan, and tells the tale of a French silkwork smuggler who travels to Japan regularly for supplies, leaving his young wife alone for months on end, falling in love instead with a Japanese woman. The storyline was just ok for me...I found the sensuality attached to the Japanese woman unnecessary and confuses the plot a bit. But other than that, the set and costume design were wonderful. It doesn't make any pretense at the old world grandeur, but adopts the Japanese wabi-sabi ideology (I dunno if that was a conscious decision, but it turned out well). Old buildings were allowed to be crumbly, gardens were allowed to be overgrown, and it looked more beautiful for it.
As a side note, tho...I hate the tagline

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Next, a classic. The fabulous destiny of Amelie Poulain, or Amelie for short. The cinematography is excellent. I remember my lecturer showed us a clip from Amelie to illustrate exemplary camera coordination. It is a story about a girl who grew up with eccentric parents, thus making her friendless, but with an overactive imagination instead. Fittingly, you should watch out for the intro of the movie,which shows how Amelie viewed life as a little girl, and may remind some of you of how you saw the world as a child too. The music is composed by Yann Tiersen, whose style incorporates traditional French music. Check out his other works too.


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In my previous entry, I wrote about that little Reader's Digest book, and one of the authors in there was Paul Gallico. I liked his style of charming naivity, so I went on to watching a movie based on another one of his books;Lili, based on the book;Love of seven dolls.Filmed in 1953, it's a movie from back in the day, sans flashy modern special effects. I guess then they had to rely more heavily on the actors and how they could entertain the audience. So it was refreshing for me to watch an old classic, with song and dance, and somehow it was just as good or even better than the big budget stuff we are getting nowadays. So now i think i'm about to get hooked on old movies...I realised I haven't watched a great many of them. But meanwhile I'd recommend you to watch this one.(I doubt you'd find it in the stores in Malaysia, but you can always rely on Youtube*cough*)The story is about an awkward young woman who has come to the city to earn a living, but ends up working in a carnival when she finds out the baker she was looking for had passed away. There, she becomes infatuated with a womanising magician, ignoring the bad tempered puppeteer who gave her her job and had fallen in love with her.

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OK, and while we're still at it, lets throw in a Disney cartoon too(lol). Nothing much to say about the animation though. I remembered this one more for it's music. It's kind of strange for Disney to be producing a film as dark as Hunchback(something that critics love to chew on, Disney always painted everything in candy colours, and they threw out Tim Burton before he became famous, and now they want him back)With themes such as murder, lust and racism, it doesn't seem in line with the happy Disney brand.

But back to the music,the soundtrack was composed by Alan Menken (Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast,etc) and lyrics written by Stephen Schwartz (Pocahontas, Prince of Egypt,etc.) Somehow I thought the lyrics were beautiful. I've been playing the soundtrack looped on my iPod for awhile now. But most of all I thought Paul Kandel did a good job in the role of Clopin, the lead Gypsy. Here, a background in broadway really made a difference in singing and voice acting as opposed to a background in film. It's all about taking that extra step and not just singing well, but keeping in mind that it's really acting with one's voice alone.

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And lastly, notice the poll at the side? I plan to make it a permanent feature with various topics, so take part, check back for results and have fun!