Try to put pure joy into words. There are plenty of valuable adjectives and beautiful metaphors in the English language, but nothing comes close to the reality and perfectly captures how you feel completely filled with happiness. To echo with joy. Floating on cloud nine. No, to adequately capture this feeling requires more than just words. You need pictures, you need sounds, you need story. You need… Amelia.
Leaded by Jean Pierre Jeunet, the 2001 fantasy romance, was recently released on a Blu-ray steelbook limited edition, and it felt like the perfect opportunity to revisit a film that has long been one of my personal favorites. I saw Amelia When it first came out in theaters I was immediately obsessed with it. It had and still has its own energy, attitude and voice. I watched it often in the years that followed.
But many years have passed since then, and to be honest I hadn’t seen it in a while. During this time the world has changed. I have changed. And when I came over Amelia This week it hit me in a way I could never have imagined. From the first moments when the film begins to tell of random acts of beauty taking place simultaneously all over France, a wave of emotions washed over me. Could it have been the second glass of wine I enjoyed? Secure. And yet from the first picture Amelia You know something special is coming your way. Something that, if you’ve already experienced it, is almost even more exciting because you know what to expect: a cinematic rollercoaster ride full of laughter, love and exhilaration.
For anyone who may not have seen the film yet: Amelia follows the life of an introverted woman (played with an infectious, contagious gentleness by Audrey Tautou) who finds meaning in helping others through random acts of kindness. Amélies Actions make everyone around her happy, but she’s still sad, so she tries to use the same tactics on her crush, a man named Nico, played by Mathieu Kassovitz.
Amelia however, is so much more than just that act. It is a celebration of life. A reminder that the good you have brought into the world can and will come back to you. As Amélie makes her way through Jeunet’s vibrant, lush Paris, you can’t help but smile the whole time. The film is hilarious, sweet, heartbreaking and empowering, often all at the same time. Every single character is completely relatable, but completely unique and specific. Every line of dialogue or information seems random, but also absolutely correct and targeted. Furthermore, Jeunet adds moments of fantasy that enrich the world even further. Paintings move, bedside figures talk, and people melt into the floor – all adding an extra level of wonder to an already breathtaking world. You just can’t watch Amelia and don’t feel fantastic. It captures so many hyper-specific but extremely relatable slices of life while creating a world full of magic and wonder.
These feelings flowed through me throughout the entire rehearsal. I grinned, I laughed, I often wiped away tears as moments I loved and quoted as a child passed before me. Then, at the end, when Jeunet really stepped on the gas, I became a crying pig. This is largely because the film does such a fantastic job of making you love everyone and everything that happens on screen in a way that you would never dream of doing in 99% of other films. But a small part was also just a reflection of the world today compared to almost 25 years ago. Things are always messed up. People are always sad. But watching a movie that was so joyful, so positive, so obsessed with the beauty of life made me think about the good things in my life more than usual, and that was a gift.
Life is hard, but it can also be very beautiful. And this is especially the case if you use part of it to watch Amelia. It’s a perfect film. A celebration of all that is possible and good in the world, told in a way you’ve never seen before and may never see again. I loved it before, but watching it again I love it more than I ever remembered.
The new Amelia Steelbook is available here.
Want more io9 news? Find out when you can expect the latest Wonder, war of starsAnd Star Trek Releases, what’s next for the DC Universe in film and televisionand everything you need to know about the future of Doctor Who.