Five Facts About Micmacs
The Amelie director is back with his curiously-titled latest.
Jean-Pierre Jeunet is one of France's most revered directors. His 2001 modern classic, Amelie, is the most successful French-language film of all time, raking in over £112 million at the worldwide box office. Dalliances into Hollywood have been less successful, with 1997's Alien Resurrection receiving a critical mauling and an attempt to adapt Yann Martel's Life of Pi abandoned at the eleventh hour.
Now Jeunet is back where he belongs, in France. And his extraordinary imagination has created a new set of highly original characters for his latest film, Micmacs. In it, Dany Boon is a hapless slacker who enlists a bunch of quirky underdogs to help him defeat the weapons manufacturers responsible for his father's death. RT brings you five facts about Jeunet's latest creation (and, yes, we do explain that baffling title...)
Fact #1: The Unlikely Inspiration is Disney Meets Sergio Leone
"You know Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," exclaims Jean-Pierre Jeunet, waving his arms around with excitement. "Well, I wanted to create something funny and imaginative like that: a stupid band of seven people. And also I wanted a story of revenge because I love Once Upon a Time in the West so much.
"I put everything I have into this film," laughs Jeunet. "There are no limits -- it's all of my influences at once. Guillaume Laurant, my writing partner, and I note down everything we hear. Then, when we write a script, we open the box of details and use them. Only when the box is packed full of ideas to we start to write. The principle of the Walt Disney Company is to have one idea per shot and I try to do that too."
Continue onto the next page as Jeunet talks about his star Dany Boon, working in Hollywood and Harry Potter.
James Macleod
I saw this film at the Glasgow Film Festival and it was great. You should definitely give it a watch.
Feb 24 - 04:51 AM