Absolutely Fantastic

A Disappointing Continuation

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

Irma Vep (1996) Director: Oliver Assayas 4/10 Maggie Cheung runs the show both in the fictional set and the real set, which might be the same thing? From two different sources, significant portion of the subtitles from the French speakers are translated as "inaudible"; Seriously? Cheung plays herself here, a Chinese actress recruited by a has been director, who seems completely confused as to what he wants from his cast and film, except that Maggie has to play Irma. Commentary on French Cinema at the time? Add a love triangle complete with lesbian love, a latex catsuit complete with leather and zipper, a stealthy shiny necklace caper complete with rooftop getaway scenes, an unbalanced director complete with unexplained absences from the set and marital drama, and what do we get? Poor film within film Anagram for Vampire At least Cheung was good. Haibun is a prosimetric (written partly in prose and partly in verse) poem in which most commonly one haiku is included after the prose, serving as a climax or epiphany to what came before. #Haibun #PoemReview

This is a movie about making a remake of an actual French silent film called Les Vampires. Maggie Cheung plays, get this, Maggie Cheung. Ms. Cheung has consistently been one of the best actors in film in the last twenty five years. Her versatility is admirable. In this film you get everything involved with the film, the set, the script, the discussions behind the camera, the disappointment after watching the rushes. Its like a reality movie about making a film. It feels like a documentary, which is a quality that is very admirable. Ms. Cheung looks pretty great poured into a black latex outfit for the film. You get everything here. Ms. Cheung speaks English here, and the subtitles on my version of the film are sometimes unintentionally funny (they are so wrong). See this film, it is entertaining and Maggie Cheung is her usual great self. I greatly enjoyed it.

An odd little piece of cinematic work by Olivier Assayas on a brief episode (fictional) about a Hong Kong actress brought to France by an eccentric director to play the title role in his revival of a silent movie, Irma Vep makes reference to, among other things, Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman in "Batman Returns" (1992), in the context of the body tight latex outfit designed for the heroine.As a movie about making movies, Irma Vep has considerably less to offer than Truffaut's "Day for Night" (1973). However, Maggie Cheung, 8 years before winning best actress in Cannes with "Clean" (2004) and playing herself in this stylish satire, was well received by critics, one of whom described one of her scenes thus: "When Maggie hears that Zoé is attracted to her, she's both charmed and incredulous: a swath of emotions, from confusion to cautious delight, passes across her face with the subtlety and playfulness of ripples on a lake." With only a hint of a plot, Irma Vep looks more like a series or sketches, or even a documentary, sustained by nervous energy. While the satire on the current (1996) state of movie-making in France would mean considerably more to people familiar with the scene, the movie on the while is more style than substance to the general audience.

This truly is a film for film elites. I really enjoy films about human relationships and films about social injustice. I don't enjoy uber-intellectual movies that discuss film-making in a way that can be understood by only a limited number of folks who are keyed into interpretions of art house films. This is not a film for a wide audience, though at best it makes the uninitiated curious. Overall, films made for a select few should be available to the select few only. The rest of us who stumble on it at our local video store sit for a painful 96 minutes waiting for the plot and story to congeal enough for us to understand what the heck it's all about. We come out empty-handed in the end. It is a waste and it isn't. I know what people are bitching about with regards to intellectual French films, but then again, I'm not sure if I really care.