Dream catchers
The Delicatessen duo go to town… THE CITY OF LOST CHILDREN 15
Adoe-eyed child watches as Santa Claus comes down the chimney. But then follows another St. Nick, and another – and three through the door – as a beautiful dream turns into a disquieting nightmare. So begins Delicatessen directors Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet’s second – and to date last – collaboration, The City Of Lost Children, a film as strange and stunning as a Salvador Dalí exhibition.
Co-written with Gilles Adrien, it’s a kinetic comic-book carnival, set in a French port and driven by Ron Perlman’s strongman One, who’s desperate to retrieve his little brother from Krank (Daniel Emilfork), an oil-rig dwelling inventor who is stealing children’s dreams. Accompanying him is orphaned girl Miette ( Judith Vittet, meant to look like a cross between Olive Oyl and Minnie Mouse, explains costume designer Jean Paul Gaultier in the extras).
This only scratches the surface of a fairytale universe populated by clones, fleas, fanatics, dwarfs and even a talking brain. Partly shot by cinematographer Darius Khondji, the very same year he DP’d on David Fincher’s Se7en, it’s one of the handsomest movies in French-film history. Inspired by Terry Gilliam, its watery world is painted in murky greens and sunflower yellows, beautifully rendered in this new Blu-ray transfer.
If the emotions are sometimes buried beneath the narrative, Jeunet and Caro’s oddball humour pulls you through. True, in a world populated by more freaks than a Tod Browning reunion the effect is almost overwhelming. But it’s hard to begrudge any film teeming with such invention.
Extras include behind-the-scenes footage (screen tests, kids’ workshop) and a 26-minute Making Of. There’s also a brief interview with Gaultier, and footage from his studio as the actresses playing Siamese twins try on three-legged trousers. “It’s a little over the top,” says one. Well,
James Mottram yes – but in a (very) good way.
EXTRAS › Commentary › Making Of › Interview