Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

I don't know if this is the kind of movie anyone ends up liking, but it can't be said that it isn't interesting. Taking place in a dystopian, almost apocalyptic world, "Delicatessen" takes one on a surrealistic and nightmarish voyage populated by freaks tending toward normalcy, but one has to look hard to find it. The woman with voices in her head was strange enough, but the guy who lived in a swamp for an apartment, populated by frogs and snails, had me wondering just what kind of boarding house Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) was running. Of course we get that answer in due course. The only likeable character in the film for me was Clapet's daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac), though I did have to question her judgment in men when she fell for the advances of newest boarder Louison (Dominique Pinon). Then again, the chances of meeting anyone more appealing was probably out of the question with this entire band of merry misfits. With "Delicatessen", you don't quite get the gory spectacle of Sweeney Todd, or the understated menace of 1960's "The Little Shop of Horrors", but what you have is a distorted look into the frenzied imagination of directors Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet who blend an eclectic cast of characters into a nightmare world where anything can happen. My favorite piece was the choreographed Hawaiian bed spring scene, which doesn't seem to make any sense when I describe it, but stands out as one of the more 'normal' sequences in the entire story.

Jean-Pierre Jeunet is the man behind AMELIE but ten years before that he made the equally quirky, if not more so, DELICATESSEN, a film about the lives and loves of the bizarre characters living inside a run-down apartment building. A film more French in feel and tone you couldn't wish for, and this is a movie with style to spare. In many ways it reminded me of the novels of the great 19th century writer Emile Zola, who often shone a light on society's foibles in a similar way.Saying that, although I liked this film on a superficial level, I found it difficult to love it. It's a definite case of style over substance, and there isn't really much 'meat' to go with the plot. The villain of the piece is a caricature and there's a sense of inertia dragging through the early and middle scenes; it only really picks up at the admittedly impressive climax. Still, the cast are good, the humour is droll, and there's a part for Franco regular Howard Vernon, so it can't all be bad.

In a post-apocalyptic France of the future, meat has become exceedingly rare. So much so that it now can be used as currency. The residents of an apartment block above a deli have come to depend heavily on the strange man, Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) employed as their butcher. Then one day an entertainer named Louison (Dominique Pinon) comes to the place to accept a job as a handyman. Louison finds himself quite taken with Clapets' sexy daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac), but his new life may not be what it's cracked up to be. He may have some other purpose in the building other than odd jobs.At its best, this completely off the wall and extremely stylized French take on post-nuke and cannibal cinema is one of the most original films of its kind. The co-directors, Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, give "Delicatessen" a striking visual design, largely avoiding cool colours like blue (although there are occasional flashes of green); the colour palette consists of a lot of yellows, oranges, reds, and browns. It's a clever hook, but also making this a worthy entertainment are the incredible energy and the consistent tone of dark, and farcical, humour. There's nothing else this viewer has seen that is quite like "Delicatessen", and that can only be a good thing.The performances themselves are very stylized, with the well chosen actors going for broke a lot of the time. Pinon and Dougnac are appealing in the leading roles. Also leaving a big impression are Dreyfus, Karin Viard, Ticky Holgado, Anne-Marie Pisani, Howard Vernon, and especially Silvie Laguna as the troubled Aurore, driven to stage very elaborate suicide attempts by "voices". Caro can be seen on screen as Fox, one of the cave dwellers.Caro and Jeunet are able to reach some appreciable heights of lunacy here, matched by the wonderfully memorable imagery throughout.This one gets a solid recommendation.Eight out of 10.

DelicatessenIn a post-apocalyptic future the world's Cheez Whiz supply would have to be used to re-caulk all the buildings.Thankfully the tenants in this sci-fi comedy don't have to lick cracks for sustenance.On the ground floor of a dilapidated apartment is a butcher (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) who always has fresh meat despite there being a food shortage.Answering an ad in the newspaper, Louison (Dominique Pinon) lands the job of assistant to the butcher.Eventually Louison's charms win over the butcher's daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac). But with her father planning on putting Louison on the menu, she seeks the assistance of an underground cell of rebellious vegetarians. Conceptualized by the director of Amélie, Delicatessen is a quirky cannibal love-story crammed with eccentric characters that never takes itself too seriously, or too lighthearted.Furthermore, with all the hormones and preservatives we ingest, human meat would have a very long shelf life.Green Lightvidiotreviews.blogspot.ca