Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece

GrimPrecise I'll tell you why so serious

Derrick Gibbons An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

Staci Frederick Blistering performances.

theicephoenix This movie is weird and doesn't really make sense at all. Some scenes are horrifyingly strange that I almost couldn't stand watching this movie to the end.

grantss France, post-apocalypse. Food is scarce and the residents of a block of flats must exist on what they can. Operating out of the ground floor of the building, and living in one of the flats, is a butcher. He has a method for procuring meat - by hiring a handyman for the building and then killing him. Food stocks are once again running low so he hires a handyman, Louison. However, the butcher's daughter, Julie, falls for Louison and will go to any length to prevent him from getting the chop, including getting him kidnapped by some not-entirely competent terrorists/rebels. High jinks ensue.Wickedly dark, off-beat, anarchic and clever. Very original plot with some very funny moments and a subversive current running through it. Some good drama too. Solid direction: dark lighting and a minimalist set help the post- apocalyptic, impoverished feel. Good performances all round, especially from Dominique Pinon as Louison and Marie-Laure Dougnac as Julie.

oscar-nicholson This really is an absolutely superb film what's more its the kind of film that makes you sit up and take notice. Jeunet & Caro have created a true masterpiece. This movie is most definitely not for everyone but definitely all of my friends and I enjoyed it. If you love to watch a good witty, dark humoured movie, then this indeed is the movie for you.This movie is definitely what you might consider an off-beat style and I definitely love watching it time and time again! It can't be classified just as a romance I mean this film has a bit everything for everyone. Well worth watching!

rcolgan Delicatessen is a strange little treat from the French director Jean- Pierre Jeunet, the director of other great modern French films like Amélie. But instead of the melancholy of Amelie, Delicatessen instead focuses on very dark humour, being based around a cannibalistic butcher who lures in victims to his apartment block so he can kill them and sell them as meat to his cannibalistic tenants. He does this in a post apocalyptic world where food appears to be scarce and people have become more willing to show their barbaric nature in order to survive.And this is where the films focus lies. For it is less interested in the post apocalyptic world, but instead focuses on the characters and the various tenants who live in the building and their dark humour . A majority of the characters will have their own distinct personalities that make them quite memorable. There's one tenant who keeps quiet throughout the film, keeping an inventory of frogs and snails to represent the side of fine French cuisine in contrast to the more barbaric man eating side of the film. Then there's the girl who constantly keeps trying to commit suicide and failing in the most darkly comedic ways. It's with characters like these where the film does gain its personality and it's many awkward chuckles that are somewhere between comedy and tragedy.The film also succeeds at creating both likable protagonists and despicable antagonists. Louison (the lead protagonist) is an extremely charismatic young boy who is both very kind to all the tenants in the building and very skilled being a clown and displaying a nice introductory scene using bubbles to entertain th kids of the apartments. Then there's the lead girl, Julie, who is very brave working to stop Louison from being butchered. Similarly, Louison often protects her making their relationship extremely dependant on one another.Then the antagonist Clapet is also very memorable. The film makes it clear that he is a despicable man within the first five minutes on screen as he commits brutal murder, but feels no remorse about doing it, instead appearing to even enjoy it. At times he's slightly overplayed, but this assists in making sure he stands out as the most insane, amongst an already insane cast of characters.The style the film is shot is also very interesting as for the most part the entire story is confined to the apartment building. Through this it helps to create both a claustrophobic feeling and makes the characters feel even more detached from the rest of the world keeping the story very self contained. Also the cinematography uses a fairly dark tone, assisting the film to get a distinct look and help it stand apart from other apocalyptic futures.However, whilst everything that was in the film remained effective, throughout the film I couldn't help but feel there was lost potential. For example, whilst what I saw of the apocalyptic world was interesting, I didn't feel like we saw enough of it. Presumably what they were going for was to create some mystery as to the world, with there being a great deal of uncertainty as to when the film was even set with the likes of black and white TV's being used. But I feel the film would have been stronger if they had expanded on certain elements of the world like creating some bizarre shows on television or hints at why there is such a food shortage.It also feels like the film would have benefited from a longer run time. It took a lot of nice scenes to slow down and build up the relationship between the two leads showing them playing instruments together to create a more natural relationship. But this carries with it the problem that the plot ends up feeling more rushed with less time to make the different characters arcs complete. For example, tenants such as the Landlords mistress feel like good characters but don't get enough time for us to learn enough about them.Though the major missed opportunity that I see in the film is we don't really see any of the characters eating any of the human meat, despite the entire film centred around cannibalism. We see it being given to them and there reactions to getting it, but it does feel like a missed opportunity by not showing them actually eat it. It's an opportunity to get a good thrill, but it never seems like the director used it despite the several opportunities he could have.But in spite of this it remains a good film with a distinct style. It's certainty worth the watch because it is something different. With its nice shooting style and interesting characters it delivers some entertaining humour and dark visuals.