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Film Overview - Amelie

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In 2001, Jean-Pierre Jeunet directed the romantic comedy, "Amelie," which he'd written along with Guillaume Laurant. Amelie is an excellent illustration of several uses of film techniques. Not only that, but it is a great film to breakdown and show fragments of, including but not limited to its form, content, central themes, and cinematic language and techniques. This storyline also holds multiple implicit and explicit meanings. The content of Amelie is just that. Amelie is the focus of the film. She is the protagonist and her own antagonist at times as well. Jeunet uses editing to his advantage in this movie by including various close-ups and shots that dolly in. One of the central themes of the picture is Audrey Tautou (portraying Amelie), putting in her absolute best effort to enhance the lives of those around her, while making it look effortless. Although she is dealing with an intense amount of isolation, in her childhood it was how her life played out and as she matured, almost more of a self-seclusion situation. In the first few moments of the flick, the audience becomes acquainted with the element of Amelie’s mother missing from the picture, due to a freak accident. She has a pet fish, which she perceives as a type of friend, gets released. She is surrounded by a small circle of individuals close to her, they don't completely understand her. Amelie is alone. The only life that Amelie knows is a life of loneliness, and this is something that she carries on with her. There is a scene in the film where Amelie is in a subway train station. The director uses sounds from an old record player, which is held by a homeless man, and the echoes of footsteps to set the mood for the moment. Bringing up the central theme of Amelie improving the lives of others, she places a few coins in the homeless man’s tin can. Amelie drops an object onto the ground which rolls over to a gentleman down the corridor, causing her to have an hallucina

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