Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Adèle Palm Beach

The Extraordinary Adventures of Adèle Blanc-Sec

What happened to Luc Besson? He made a couple of good films back in the days. I was hoping for something in the line of Judex or Irma Vep, but the film is more like a stupid comedy a clueless American Hollywood director would make. And Besson is French, goddammit! It has almost nothing to do with the Tardi comics, it's more like Indiana Jones meets The Mummy 3. Adèle is given a backstory, about a dead sister, to give her motivation. She's Adèle Blanc-Sec! She's supposed to be kind of a mystery! She doesn't need no stinkin' motivation! So, first Adéle, then Tintin, what's next?

The Palm Beach Story

Okay, it's a classic, it's screwball comedy, Preston Sturges, Claudette Colbert and everything, but I found it a bit hard to get into this film. It's far from It Happened One Night. What do we learn in the film?
Rich people sure are silly.
Foreigners sure are funny.
Black people (servants and porters) sure are stupid.
Maybe I was in the wrong mood... The film almost redeems itself in the ending, that actually is pretty funny, referring back to the crazy, unexplained opening credits.

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