From: blj@mithrandir.cs.unh.edu (Brian L. Johnson)
Subject: REVIEW: DELICATESSEN
Reply-To: blj@mithrandir.cs.unh.edu (Brian L. Johnson)
Organization: ?
Date: Tue, 18 Aug 1992 13:35:41 GMT
Followup-To: rec.arts.movies
Summary: r.a.m.r. #01491
Keywords: author=K.Johnson

                               DELICATESSEN
                       A film review by Ken Johnson
                        Copyright 1992 Ken Johnson

104 min., not rated, Drama/Comedy, 1991, French w/ English subtitles
Directors: Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Marc Caro
Cast: Dominique Pinon, Marie-Laure Dougnac, Jean-Claude Dreyfuss,
      Karin Viard, Rufus, Ticky Holgado, Silvie Laguna, Jaques Mathou,
      Jean-Francois Perrier, Anne-Marie Pisani, Howard Vernon,
      Chick Ortega

     In the post-apocalypse future, when fresh meat is almost impossible
to come by, Jean-Claude Dreyfuss runs a delicatessen/apartment house.
Dreyfuss gets meat for his delicatessen by getting handy men to come to
the apartment building, and after they have done some work, Dreyfuss
slaughters them.  After clown Doninique Pinon's partner is killed by
roving savages for meat, he goes to work for Dreyfuss as a handyman, not
knowing what his fate is going to be.  Marie-Laure Dougnac, Dreyfuss's
daughter, falls in love with Pinon and tries to save him from Dreyfuss.

     I found DELICATESSEN to be an extremely enjoyable film, and highly
recommend it to anyone who has a taste for the bizarre.  I have been
waiting since I saw the first review on DELICATESSEN for it to come to
my local art/import theater so I could see it because it sounded really
good.  I am pleased to say that after seeing the film I am really happy
that I went to see it.  It was better than I expected it to be.  On a
scale of zero to five I give DELICATESSEN a five.  DELICATESSEN is not
rated but contains violence, explicit language, and adult situations.

     The actor who I felt did the best job is Chick Ortega, who played
the mailman.  His character seemed to really have depth.  I also
thought that his character was one of the neatest, although all the
characters in the film were fascinating, and bizarre, in their own way.
The acting in the film was great.  The story line was well written.
All of the characters in the film were interesting, but weird.  I felt
myself wanting to know more about each one.  They were each unique, yet
they were all alike.  I really got drawn into this film and I would have
gone to see it again, but before I got a chance to go back the film had
finished its run as it only played for seven days.  If this film comes
to a theater near you, I highly suggest that you go see it.  I loved it
and I am not the biggest fan of foreign films.

     The scenery was bleak, yet interesting.  The world that was created
is MAD-MAX-like, which could be expected because they are both post-
apocalypse.  I found myself wondering though, what was beyond the
delicatessen, or if it was all wasteland.  The one part of the film that
I found rather hard to accept was how bad the technology was.  None of
the items used by anybody was new.  It was, I would estimate, pre-50's.
Is the film implying that all of the new technology will be wiped out
with the nuclear war?

     One last note, this film is subtitled and the language spoken is
the original language.  I prefer subtitled film to dubbed films because
it annoys me when the mouths are saying something different than what I
hear.  Those people who hate subtitling will probably get annoyed with
this film and might prefer to wait for a dubbed video cassette version
as one will probably show up.

Ken J.
blj@mithrandir.cs.unh.edu