I arrived at the Palace Como in South Yarra to a lively crowd who had gathered for one of the biggest draw-cards of the annual French film festival - Jean Pierre Jeunet's Mic Macs. The usual whisper quiet refinement of the elegant art-house theatre was buzzing with anticipation for a film Jeunet has described as 'his best yet'. Against an impressive resume of direction including the much acclaimed Amelie (1996) and Delicatessen (1994); expectations were set with a towering benchmark. I entered the theatre amidst the burbling of the cool Francaise set and Jean Pierre enthusiasts for what I was sure would be another quirky and vivid spectacle in Mic Macs...
Micmacs à tire-larigot is the tale of a misfortunate fellow named Bazil (comedian Danny Boon). After suffering the loss of his father at war as a young boy, we are fast forwarded to a middle aged Bazil doing the graveyard shift at his job as a video store clerk where he becomes a victim in a drive by shooting ... leaving him with a bullet lodged in his scalp. To add to the sting of having a bullet floating at the surface of his mind tank, which could very well kill him if moved, he is released from hospital to find himself without home or job. After being informed of his replacement at the movie store, he is offered a small piece of information which becomes the catalyst in his plan for revenge - on the weapons manufacturers responsible for the bullet and the mine that took his father.
Turned out onto the streets, Bazil gets up to some creative shenanigans in the streets of Paris in his attempts to get by. During this time he meets a Back to the Future-esque mad scientist type, who gives him a home and job in his junkyard laboratory. Here he is introduced to his new 'family' - a collective of strangely situated misfits. The film from here follows the comical ventures of Bazil and his newly acquired circus troupe of friends in their mission to serve the two head honchos of the weapon manufacturing companies their just desserts.
This film certainly has Jeunet's trademark whimsy ... and as usual remarkably traverses the boundaries between the fantastical and the everyday. It had the usual line-up of pointedly imperfect characters with their extreme eccentricities. Yet with a plot very reliant on the theatrics of the characters to fill the many gaps in dialogue, the effect is of a circus like spectacle for the viewer. Boon's presence as lead is without the charm of Audrey Tatou in Amelie and his Chaplin attempting antics achieve merely a very good mime or an inferior Mr. Bean.
All in all, while this eclectic cataclysm of characters serve up some extremely silly scenarios to comical effect, within a setting distinctive of Jeunet's magical vision ... that characters failed to totally engage me. Although, their was some shrewd political content worthy of commendation.
Jeunet fans should see this for the wonderful detail and imagery of his sets and some classic moments of black humour. Beginners - see 'Amelie' first. And for the young this could be a fanciful introduction to foreign film as perhaps a refreshing substitute to Burton's Alice in Wonderland.
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