The City of Lost Children (1995)

Jean-Pierre Jeunet has an interesting directing resume, with Ameile(I loved it), and Delicatessen(lost me), and Micmacs(funny). City of Lost Children is another fantasy with a mad scientist abducting children and stealing their dreams. The cast is wide ranging and the usual odd ball characters portrayed in Jeunet's other works. I was exhausted by the visual throw everything up on the screen and try to follow this marathon of strange behavior. The most interesting role is that of the circus strong man, One(Ron Perlman), who is a good guy trying to rescue the children from the bad doctor. The sets are intricate and colorful but the twists and turns of the story are overdone, without Amelie's wit and charm to save it.

every time i view this film, i'm always impressed at what a remarkable achievement it truly is. i believe this to be one of the greatest works of visual fantasy since the works of Cocteau.CGI effects movies would do well to study exactly how this film's visuals are applied and used so effectively. even before the popularity of today's CGI driven blockbusters, visual effects in movies could often be "showy" or distracting from the storyline and diminish empathy with a film's characters and situations. not so with 'Lost Children', the visuals only enhance the atmosphere and effectiveness of the story telling. the visuals become a protagonist, of sorts, and enhance each sequence to become more compelling and immerse the viewer emotionally.i've always loved the Disney family classic 'Mary Poppins', and feel it to have a lot of heartfelt message. but the reliance on technical visuals often makes the film a little confusing and feel episodic. there are so many visual effects and ideas that 'Poppins' can leave the viewer a little confused about what is actually supposed to be happening and what it's about. the storyline of 'Lost Children' is rather abstracted, but the viewer never really loses sight of film's actors and their motivations. instead of distracting from the storyline, the visual effects actually make the events more compelling.this film is also superb in every department. the acting, the screenplay, the music and production design, and of course, it's marvelous technology.Ron Perlman's sideshow strong man and Judith Vittet's tough minded street orphan, are two of the most memorable and compelling performances i've seen in cinema. the other performances from the flea circus master to the sinister and horrid Siamese twins, are impeccable. and where in Heaven's name did they find so many cute and irresistible kids. many of these tykes and toddlers are no more than three or four years old and some of them are effective actors as well.even though i would very much recommend this film for children, even if it is a little disturbing and at times frightening, this film is not for everyone's taste. but i would venture to wonder if those people were ever really children or ever had a deep and unexplainable dream or nightmare. dreams are the very fabric this movie is woven of.this film is for anyone who loves and is defensive of children and childhood. and for those who truly believe that their dreams speak to them.

I'm fine with movies that choose style over substance. I absolutely love Brazil, if that tells you anything. I was totally prepared to see a movie that had minimal plot and coherence, and was ready to simply immerse myself in the 'grotesque and disturbing imagery' as the rating touts. Another thing that intrigued me was the box art, which looked almost Aztec/Steampunkish. I thought that perhaps that type of imagery would dominate the film, or at least figure prominently in it. It did not. Instead the film mainly features imagery and sets from what appears to be the city from Alex Proyas's Dark City if it had been located on a French coastline in the 1940s.But getting to the point, what ruined this movie for me was not that it was to unfocused and lacking in action. It was the filmmakers insistence that everything be so insufferably f*cking goofy. I felt like I was watching a bad rip off of a Terry Gilliam film, made by somebody who completely missed what made his style so great. First of all, this is a tame movie. Not that that is my reason for disliking it, I'd just like to set the record straight. The film's rating is absolutely undeserved. It easily could have been rated PG-13, and contained nothing too disturbing for a young teenager to stomach. And even then, any scene that even began to create a sense of foreboding atmosphere was immediately ravaged by unnecessary and painfully protracted scenes of people acting like mentally damaged infants.Look, its not that I don't "get it". I understand what they were going for here, its just that they f*cked up (In my opinion). To put it simply, an otherwise chilling, absorbing film best described as Bioshock meets Brazil, is marred by disgustingly indulgent characters and camera-work by the filmmakers. For instance, the character of the mad man who kidnaps children to steal their dreams because he cannot have any of his own should be instantly tragic and threatening, a truly fantastic character simply by design. Any hopes of such a thing are tossed aside within the first few moments as he and the rest of his, what I suppose you could call family, scream directly into the camera for over a minute. Without any thought, they instantly reduce what should have been an incredible character with so much potential to a pathetic whimpering baby in the body of a man. They really seem to be TRYING to act stupid and over the top. Why? What's the point? There is no subtlety or really any care given to anything in the film, least of all that first pointless scene. It really seems as though that scene existed for the sole purpose of destroying the disturbing atmosphere that the film was trying to achieve right out of the starting gate.In the end the film had so much potential, and so much style to work with, but it was wasted in favor of the film's oh-so-quirky antics. If this is French dark absurdist comedy, perhaps I'm just more suited to British dark absurdist comedy where the comedy goes hand in hand with the atmosphere rather than the former beating the latter into submission and sticking its @ss into the camera lens.

I was given this film by a friend to watch. It first sight I was skeptical. It is now, by far, one of my favorite films of all time!Visually it is unreal. I could simply turn off the sound and stare at it. Even watching the film in its native tongue is impressive. I wish more films would follow suit. You rarely see American films with the mix of such heavy subjects tied with humor. Maybe some day someone will come along and mimic the feel and look of this film. We could only be so lucky!Ron Perlman is very good in it as well as his sidekick..Miette. I was further impressed that Ron had to learn French just for the role. How many actors would do that, I ask?I would suggest anyone who is a film buff to see this movie. It will change the way you look at cinema.