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Critics Consensus: A remarkable achievement, Playtime's packs every scene with sight gags and characters that both celebrates and satirizes the urbanization of modern life.
Critic Consensus: A remarkable achievement, Playtime's packs every scene with sight gags and characters that both celebrates and satirizes the urbanization of modern life.
All Critics (44) | Top Critics (11) | Fresh (44) | Rotten (0) | DVD (9)
Tati's despair is modulated by a sense of wonder.
Jacques Tati's 1967 masterpiece still holds up as a feast of subtle sight gags, playful noise and, above all, visual wonders.
Pic takes to the 70mm process with an extraordinary impressionistic outdoor set of a new Paris, and is an observant romp during a one-day stay of a group of tourists.
For this remarkable 1967 comedy about man and his modern world, Jacques Tati attempted nothing less than a complete reworking of the conventional notions of montage and, amazingly, he succeeded.
My all-time favorite movie, this 1967 French comedy by actor-director Jacques Tati almost certainly has the most intricately designed mise en scene in all of cinema.
Playtime is a peculiar, mysterious, magical film.
Playtime is fairly described as a masterpiece of slapstick comedy, but the more I see it, the more I feel it's a 124 minute nightmare of modern life.
Playtime is not a Hulot excursion but a lengthy look at the Americanised Paris of le drugstore and le parking-with, Tati being Tati.
... an accumulation of minor touches, little dissonances, imaginative observations, and pieces of creative business: hundreds of details that erupt with lives of their own but fit together like a clockwork mechanism with a human heartbeat.
Jacques Tati's Playtime is an astringent antidote to Paris movies that are as sickly as macaroons and stuffed with views of the Eiffel Tower by night.
It took Jacques Tati close to ten years to realise his greatest achievement, but it left him virtually broke. No wonder.
For my money Playtime is the greatest film ever made.
Not only one of the most famous French films of all time, but also a definitive example of a film challenging its viewers to look beyond plot and character to discover its meaning. Utilizing 70mm to its full advantage, and truly clever sound design help propel Tati's masterpiece to "must see" status. You'll be hard pressed to find a better satirical statement on the effects of an impersonal, technologically advanced, but ultimately culturally bankrupt and dehumanized society. A perfect message for the times we live in.
Super Reviewer
This Film is from the Criterion Collection and like most movies from that collection they can be somewhat strange and this one is. Its supposed to be a comedy but I really didn't see much comical about this one. 2 stars
Tati's epic "comedy" is truly a feast for the eyes. Full of delightful little moments and the occasional giggle, Playtime isn't so much a story as it is a world put up on screen. Like the cinematic lovechild of Altman, Chaplin and Jarmusch I must admit seeing this at home and alone is probably not the optimal viewing experience. Hence a mere 3 1/2 rating. I will seek to see this projected, in which case my rating is likely to go up dramatically.
So I watched this on my laptop and not at the Ziegfield. Bad move. Still... I think I can pretty confidently say - I did not enjoy this very unique but totally aimless film. The pleasures of M. Hulot elude me once again. Zut!
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