Le Fabuleux Destin d’Amélie Poulain (Amélie everywhere else) was directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet and launched in 2001. It remains one of the most famous French films ever.
The romantic comedy has a clever, engaging, witty pace to it and explores the life of an introverted young lady in Paris.
Also boasting a fantastic soundtrack by Yann Tiersen, we’re here today to celebrate it all. Because Amélie the film… is worth it.
Exploring Magical Realism and Isolation in Amélie the Film
The plot kicks off exploring the childhood of Amélie Poulain (a fictional character) who’s born in 1974.
Her eccentric parents raise her in Paris. They decide to home school the young lady, which leads Amélie to become solitary and introspective. She relies on an active imagination to entertain herself.
After her mother dies when she’s six, her father becomes even more solitary and Amélie leads the life of a recluse.
Eventually, she leaves home at age 18. She rents a small flat and works at Café des 2 Moulins in Montmartre (a real café in Paris) and leads a simple, very quiet existence. Her landlady refers to her as the “pretty lady” upstairs.
Amélie remains very cut off from the real world, preferring to bask in escapism and solitude. At this point many viewers may conclude she’s autistic, although it’s not directly stated in the film.
That is until 31st August 1997 when she unearths a wall tile from her flat. Inside she finds an old metal box. It contains childhood memorabilia of a boy whom used to live there—she decides to track down the boy and return the item to him.
Seeing the unrestrained joy this brings the man, she decides to go out into the world and provide similar acts of good.
In fact, she makes it her life’s goal. Across the rest of the film she makes these little gestures that transform people’s lives (for the better, of course).
We must note at this point all of this plays out to the film’s excellent score, which was provided by musician Yann Tiersen (more on this further below).
In many respects everything is like a fairy tale. It’s all whimsical and that sense of magical realism there seemingly created by Amélie and her active imagination.
Despite her various antics, Amélie remains lonely.
She has an attraction to eccentric, introverted man Nino Quincampoix (Mathieu Kassovitz). She’s encouraged by local artist Mr. Dufayel to approach the man bloke, who’s interested in collecting discarded pictures from photobooths.
Eventually she works up the courage to set herself up with Nino, creating an elaborate game of cat-and-mouse with photobooth pictures to ensure they meet.
They unite and Amélie is left to enjoy the happiness of a relationship, which the film’s conclusion hints is set to blossom with Nino.
La fin!
There’s no denying this is a modern classic. An unusual feel-food movie that moves at a lively pace and doesn’t back off with the charm offensive or wit.
Key to it all is Audrey Tautou’s excellent performance as the reclusive central character. She really breathed a lot of life into the role.
Although she’s had a successful career since then, it’s a shame she’s not had the chance for any other roles to outdo this one (the Da Vinci Code in 2006 opposite Tom Hanks doesn’t count).
Asides from her performance, the crew did an amazing job turning Paris into a fantastical dreamland. It’s kind of like that there anyway, but the sense of magical realism with the colourful cinematography still helps the film stand out.
It’s obvious to see why it’s so beloved. With a life-affirming skip in its step and an accordion never far away, it’s a celebration of the quieter people in this world.
Notes on Yann Tiersen’s Fabulous Soundtrack to Amélie the Film
French-Breton and Yann Tiersen was responsible for the film’s iconic music.
He’s multi-talented and can play the guitar, piano, synthesisers, and violin. He’s also skilled with melodica, xylophone, harpsichord, piano accordion, and a typewriter.
It plays on distinctly French music sound thanks to the familiar accordion, but varies compositions up with a lively, mischievous tone (and all manner of instruments flying in from different angles).
Some of the other instruments include the banjo, bass guitar, and vibraphone (a percussion instrument).
The film’s production assistant made director Jean-Pierre Jeunet aware of Tiersen’s work. After hearing it he commissioned the composer to create new pieces for the film.
As you’d expect, the film brought Yann Tiersen to international attention. Although he denies he’s a composer as he’s not classically trained.
He’s still working to this day and his last album launch was 11 5 18 2 5 18 from 2022.
The Production of Amélie and its Lasting Legacy on Film (innit)
The film was a smash hit. Off its $10 million budget it went on to make $174.2 million worldwide. We remember it from 2001—it was just one of those films where word of mouth spread the good news about an epic film to watch.
It was nominated for, and won, all sorts of awards across Europe.
In the US it even picked up five Oscar nods, winning for Best Foreign Language Film and Best Original Screenplay (by Guillaume Laurant).
It created an immediate influence on cinema, too, leading to many imitations. There are still films launching now that are clearly influenced by Jeunet’s work. That’s most often noticeable with the colour aesthetic the director used.
A process called digital intermediate (DI) was used, manipulating colours as a way to bring attention to things in a certain scene.
The main focus was on green, red, and yellow. This choice was due to the work of Brazilian artist Juarez Machado.
This wasn’t the first film to use it as underrated 1998 comedy-drama Pleasantville put it to good use. As did a 1993 restoration of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.
But if you ask a film buff to think of a film with an inspired colour scheme, chances are they may fire back to you this unorthodox French film.
Since all the hullabaloo has died down from 2001/2002, Amélie has settled into film history in a way you’d expect of it—a cult classic.
We’re still surprised it was such a huge hit.
But it was very different. Not least as it’s a French film (and, sadly, we don’t get many of them hitting the mainstream), but also its subject matter is peculiar for mainstream audiences. This is a film about a reclusive autistic lady.
The attention to detail was incredible. Largely filmed in Paris, the crew would meticulously clean each area for a scene prior to a take.
Why? To back up the fantastical, dreamy nature of the main character’s life.
Its success put Jeunet, already famous in France, on a wider international map. However, he’s only directed four other films since this Oscar winner. His most recent was Bigbug in 2022, which launched on Netflix.
Apparently he’s finding it difficult to get investment in his projects. As he told IndieWire magazine in May 2019:
“I’ve been fighting to make a film for four years now because the world is so different now. My films are quirky and it’s not a good time for quirky movies, because everybody wants to make profit without risk.”
Though he noted that making movies such as his 1991 debut “Delicatessen” and “Amelie” was difficult at their respective times, it was still possible then to find investors who would take chances. “Now it’s much more difficult.”
We flag this up as we see a lot of individuals pursuing their right-wing agenda online claiming modern movies are rubbish due to “the woke mob” and “feminism”.
When in reality, the issue with certain modern films is typically down to corporate greed. Either investors not funding interesting new projects or interfering wildly with the ones they do back until the project is a shell of its former self.
It’s quite astonishing that the massive hit Amélie was and the man behind it is now struggling to get projects off the ground.
On the flip side, the film’s star Audrey Tautou has enjoyed a long and successful career.
She’s also a model (one glance at her is enough to confirm why), which she took up at the age of 18. But she’s been acting since 1999, first in French cinema before branching off into Hollywood after the success of Amélie.
Some Other Films Like Amélie
Finally, if you fancy a few other films like Amélie then here are some of our suggestions. That begins with the excellent Grand Budapest Hotel (2014) by Wes Anderson.
In fact, many Wes Anderson films will do it for you.
That includes The Royal Tenenbaums (2001), The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou (2004), and Moonrise Kingdom (2012).
We’d also suggest the mental health study Frank (2014), featuring an excellent performance (as always) from Michael Fassbender.
If the autistic leaning is your thing, too, alongside mental health depictions then we can highly recommend Thomas-Paul Anderson’s Punch-Drunk Love (2002).
It features a career best performance from one Adam Sandler and also has a big dollop of magical realism in there.
Of course, there’s other work by Jean-Pierre Jeunet worth checking out. That includes Micmacs (2009), Delicatessen (1991), and The City of Lost Children (1995).
Tim Burton’s numerous films (think Edward Scissorhands) may also appeal.
Or go a step further with the likes of Sylvain Chomet and his magnificent animated films, starting off with The Illusionist (2010).
The alternative to the above is just to put Amélie on a loop and watch it over and over and over. Which, we feel, some of the film’s most ardent of fans will agree with.
