France,
1956, 126 min
Shown in 1972
CREDITS
- dir
-
Jacques Tati
- prod
-
Louis Dolivet
- cam
-
Jean Bourgain
- cast
-
Jacques Tati, Jean-Pierre Zola, Adrienne Servantie, Alain Becourt, Lucien Fregis, Betty Schneider, Yvonne Arnaud
- prod co
-
Specta-Gray-Alterdel Centaure
- source
-
Walter Reade Releasing Corp.
-
COMMENTS
Jacques Tati in person.
OTHER
In this, his third film, Jacques Tati found a definitive personal style that entailed almost relegating himself to the background as an actor. Although this might have disappointed those who were entirely attached to the irrepressible Monsieur Hulot, there was, assuredly, a gain in Tati’s overall mastery; thus detachment from the center of the action gave the actor-director broader scope and vision in satirical storytelling, and Mon Oncle is a refreshing comedy in the tradition of René Clair’s A Nous la Liberte and Chaplin’s Modern Times. The story involves the Arpels, who live in a pretentious, ultra-modern house filled with gadgets that function with the same alarming precision as the machinery in Mr. Arpel’s plastics factory. Their small son, Gerard, feels lonely and restricted amidst so much stark perfection and always looks forward to visiting his Uncle Hulot, who lives at the top of a ramshackle old house in a lively quarter of the city. The Arpels, jealous of their son’s affection for Hulot, try to change th situation by finding him a job and a wife. Within this framework, Tati makes the humor in the film as diagrammatic as Arpel’s house. Hilarity follows hilarity in miraculously timed sequences, with their movement as designed and balanced as a Rene Clair minuet. The view in Mon Oncle is a child’s eye view of the world, full of innocent joy in the ordinary business of living and of wonder at the complications introduced by adults. Dialogue is of minimal importance and music and sound effects, especially in the bizarre garden-party sequence, achieve a brilliant air of fantasy. A light, elusive, heartwarming comedy, Mon Oncle is an ingenious comedy classic, to be seen again and again, with the certainty that each viewing will add something new.
—Albert Johnson
FACTOID #217
A sporadic SFIFF tradition, fashion shows are lighthearted affairs that help raise funds for the Festival. In 1968, Oakland designer Richard Tam mounted a show at the Fairmont Hotel that attracted high society; the Examiner commented that the show ’combined Tam’s simple daytime elegance with his almost theatrical evening gowns.’
