Mon Oncle (1958)

Director: Jacques Tati
Starring: Jacques Tati, Jean-Pierre Zola, Adrienne Servantie, Alain Bécourt

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If you go into a Tati movie knowing that there's no overall plot or at least no plot structure, you should be fine. The action revolves around a recurring character in Tati's work (played by Tati himself) named Hulot. I don't know if the guy ever got a first name. The movie doesn't have much dialogue, but the soundtrack is just as important as the picture as far as the gags are concerned. The whole thing is very cartoon-y. Watch Mon Oncle along with Triplets of Belleville and you'll see what I mean (and you'll see how influential Tati was to Belleville's style). To say that Tati doesn't owe an equal debt to cartoons would be unfair to animation though. Overall, Mon Oncle is a light, yet strangely damning, comedy about the absurd reliance of technology in modern, everyday life.

July 4
apartment TV, early evening

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