Sunday, 30 December 2012

Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953)



☆ ☆ ☆ 

Mr. Hulot's Holiday (1953) -- J. Tati

Monsieur Hulot (Jacques Tati) is one of those nonchalant friendly but bumbling characters who lays waste to everything orderly about him (demonstrating the principle of entropy?). The film that encases him (in his first of several appearances) is virtually dialogue-less, or at least the dialogue doesn't matter much, and thus it takes on the shape of a series of silent clown set-pieces a la Keaton or Chaplin.  Tati (who also wrote and directed) pays excruciating attention to the framing of shots, sound effects on the sound track, and the mise en scene as a whole, giving the viewer the sense that the chaos on screen is the product of well-ordered construction indeed. Charmingly French music too.


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