Mon Oncle

It's a classic Jacques Tati French comedy. It is Mon Oncle.

A man (Arpel) and wife have an extremely modern house, with electrical gizmos and a sparse decor. They also have a son who goes to a school and is sometimes picked up by the wife's brother, Mr Hulot. What story there is involves the rather lackadasical Hulot trying to be given a purpose in life so that he doesn't take the father's spot in the son's life. Arpel gets Hulot a job in his factory and his wife tries to set him up with the neighbour, but never really turns out to work that well for him. In the mean time, the son is getting up to pranks with his friends, and that's the final accidental moment that bonds father and son.

There is only a little story, and otherwise this comes across as a rather random collection of scenes, either from people coming up with it on the day, or a writer getting out of hand and not cutting anything that came into their minds. This does mean that the movie does feel long and rather incoherent at times.

As for the humour... a lot of people were continually giggling throughout this movie, but I didn't get most of it. There were a few moments when even I could get it (and I quite liked the House Eyes moment), but most of it just didn't do anything for me.

I'm glad I watched it, but it does lend more weight to watching movies on fast forward...

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