The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec reviews
Review by on 23 Sep 2010
INDIANA JONES meets AMELIE in Luc Besson's weird and wonderful adaptation of Jacques Tardi's original comics. Set in Paris in the early 20th century, the story follows the beautiful but fiery Adele Blanc-Sec, a French novelist dedicated to saving her sister no matter what stands in her way. Adele's determination sees her engaging in fatal games of tennis, white water rafting with a mummy and mastering the art of pterodactyl riding yet never breaking a sweat.
Besson delivers the story with a creative use of camera shots and a simple score from Eric Serras to support the frequent change between adventure and fantasy.
The plot does become a bit farcical at times, let down especially by the last 10 minutes, but it is saved by a captivating performance from Louise Bourgoin, who remains charming throughout and is matched by the lovable supporting characters including Adele's ever doting admirer, the ever peckish policeman and the ever so polite Egyptian mummy.
Once again Besson demonstrates his skill as a writer with fast paced and quick-witted dialogue. He manages to use a good mixture of humour to create a contrast between the more sophisticated mind of Adele and the more adolescent attitudes of the police force.
Although slightly ridiculous, what it lacks in plot it more than makes up for with its beautiful set design, charming performances and many laughs. THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADELE BLANC-SEC is good fun throughout and definitely worth seeing.
Jess Rudwick
Besson delivers the story with a creative use of camera shots and a simple score from Eric Serras to support the frequent change between adventure and fantasy.
The plot does become a bit farcical at times, let down especially by the last 10 minutes, but it is saved by a captivating performance from Louise Bourgoin, who remains charming throughout and is matched by the lovable supporting characters including Adele's ever doting admirer, the ever peckish policeman and the ever so polite Egyptian mummy.
Once again Besson demonstrates his skill as a writer with fast paced and quick-witted dialogue. He manages to use a good mixture of humour to create a contrast between the more sophisticated mind of Adele and the more adolescent attitudes of the police force.
Although slightly ridiculous, what it lacks in plot it more than makes up for with its beautiful set design, charming performances and many laughs. THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADELE BLANC-SEC is good fun throughout and definitely worth seeing.
Jess Rudwick
Review by on 23 Sep 2010
Maintaining his customary visual flair and cinematic mastery, Luc Besson returns once again with his latest auteurist vision, possibly his most audacious and visually commanding film since 1997’s imaginative THE FIFTH ELEMENT.
Utilising the talents of cinematographer Thierry Arbogast (the two worked together on THE FIFTH ELEMENT), Besson presents an impressively shot, ambitious tale packed with supernatural escapades and humorously memorable characters, coupled with all the best elements of the fantasy-adventure genre. With a playful tone and a plot scaling back to pre-war, 1912 Paris, this is an endlessly original film blending a weird and wonderful quest with bumbling policemen, reawakened mummies and a ravenous pterodactyl. Hollywood, take note.
Filling the title role is Louise Bourgoin, a stimulating screen presence who lends a watchable capability to her humorously sharp character; a debonair explorer who fuses snappy one-liners with a sentimental hidden agenda. Blanc-Sec is feisty, gorgeous and intelligent with a confident talent for tomb raiding and an impressive speciality for disguise. Think Lara Croft but without the pistols, British austerity and exaggerated bosoms. She is also a refreshing addition to Besson’s attention to strong female protagonists, previously seen with NIKITA and the pre-pubescent Matilda from LEON.
Although dragged down by an occasionally juvenile demeanour and clichéd characterisation, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is nevertheless visually rich, narratively exciting and fully deserving of its place amongst Besson’s impressive oeuvre. It’s no classic, but it is a stirring film worthy of a wider audience than it will probably receive.
Edward Frost
Utilising the talents of cinematographer Thierry Arbogast (the two worked together on THE FIFTH ELEMENT), Besson presents an impressively shot, ambitious tale packed with supernatural escapades and humorously memorable characters, coupled with all the best elements of the fantasy-adventure genre. With a playful tone and a plot scaling back to pre-war, 1912 Paris, this is an endlessly original film blending a weird and wonderful quest with bumbling policemen, reawakened mummies and a ravenous pterodactyl. Hollywood, take note.
Filling the title role is Louise Bourgoin, a stimulating screen presence who lends a watchable capability to her humorously sharp character; a debonair explorer who fuses snappy one-liners with a sentimental hidden agenda. Blanc-Sec is feisty, gorgeous and intelligent with a confident talent for tomb raiding and an impressive speciality for disguise. Think Lara Croft but without the pistols, British austerity and exaggerated bosoms. She is also a refreshing addition to Besson’s attention to strong female protagonists, previously seen with NIKITA and the pre-pubescent Matilda from LEON.
Although dragged down by an occasionally juvenile demeanour and clichéd characterisation, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is nevertheless visually rich, narratively exciting and fully deserving of its place amongst Besson’s impressive oeuvre. It’s no classic, but it is a stirring film worthy of a wider audience than it will probably receive.
Edward Frost
Review by on 21 Sep 2010
An exquisitely vivid adaptation set in the early 1900's, capturing the exaggerated comic book aesthetics and contrasts of the beautiful heroine fighting off bucktoothed baddies, surprising brains and buffoonery, thrilling adventure and high farce, subtlety and slapstick.
For those wanting even more stay in your seat for the final epilogue during the closing titles!
For those wanting even more stay in your seat for the final epilogue during the closing titles!
Review by on 20 Sep 2010
An excellent delightful unbelievable Raiders roller coaster ride, tied together by Louise Bourgoin's no nonsense determination. The comical pterocdactyl and mummified special effects added rather than detracted my wholehearted enjoyment the film. A packed cinema studio with lots of loud laughter.
Review by on 18 Sep 2010
The archaeological, action/adventure genre has become increasingly formulaic under Hollywood guidance since its rise to popularity. Conventions inspired by the Indiana Jones films have been adhered to for almost twenty years, with any exceptions failing to break into mainstream Hollywood cinema. However, similarly to his previous work of science-fiction innovation, THE FIFTH ELEMENT, Luc Besson has once again stamped his own auteurship onto a popular Hollywood genre.
Unfortunately, whilst the film may be innovative in some respects, it closely upholds many tired stereotypes and immature comedy devices that feel beneath such an esteemed director. One particular scene in which the blundering, Jacques-Clouseau-style police inspector is defecated on really encapsulates the low level to which Besson stoops for comedy at various points in this film. Occasionally descending into unforgivable absurdity, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is most definitely a flawed work.
However, with the exception of the aforementioned scenes, this is certainly an enjoyable and very amusing film. Visually, the film is as impressive as any other Besson delivering a triumph of colour and light, framing his shots with beautiful precision and delicacy. Most impressively however is Louise Bourgoin’s strength as Besson’s Adèle, helping retain much of its intended offbeat charm. The film is essentially entrusted to her and, fortunately, she manages to balance the many aspects of her talented yet vulnerable heroine with particular skill.
Despite a variety of shortcomings, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is a pleasing and enjoyable film, and certainly rivals Besson’s previous works.
Daniel Harling
Unfortunately, whilst the film may be innovative in some respects, it closely upholds many tired stereotypes and immature comedy devices that feel beneath such an esteemed director. One particular scene in which the blundering, Jacques-Clouseau-style police inspector is defecated on really encapsulates the low level to which Besson stoops for comedy at various points in this film. Occasionally descending into unforgivable absurdity, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is most definitely a flawed work.
However, with the exception of the aforementioned scenes, this is certainly an enjoyable and very amusing film. Visually, the film is as impressive as any other Besson delivering a triumph of colour and light, framing his shots with beautiful precision and delicacy. Most impressively however is Louise Bourgoin’s strength as Besson’s Adèle, helping retain much of its intended offbeat charm. The film is essentially entrusted to her and, fortunately, she manages to balance the many aspects of her talented yet vulnerable heroine with particular skill.
Despite a variety of shortcomings, THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADÈLE BLANC-SEC is a pleasing and enjoyable film, and certainly rivals Besson’s previous works.
Daniel Harling
Review by on 18 Sep 2010
A visually attractive comedy with a weak plot. Final scene seems to be setting up a sequel ...
Review by on 17 Sep 2010
A lively and hugely enjoyable opening to the festival. This is very much a French summer blockbuster directed with breathless verve and inventiveness by Luc Besson.
Cross Stephen Sommers The Mummy with Indiana Jones and add a touch of Asterix-style absurdity and you have The extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec.
It's fast, it's silly, it's dazzling and totally engaging. It's wonderful to see a big summer event movie that doesn't revolve around being a star vehicle.
Louise Bourgoin plays the eponymous heroine with effortless aplomb but she doesn't hog the camera and there's plenty of screen-time for a superb supporting cast. It's more of an ensemble film than a Hollywood film could ever be.
Luc Besson directs with tremendous, hyperactive bravura. Who else could have a pterodactyl swooping over the root-tops of Paris in 1911? The only slight disappointment was the standard of CGI when Adele was riding the pterodactyl. Maybe we have been spoiled over the years but some shots seemed more King King than Jurassic Park. Still this is a minor quibble. All in all, this was a wonderful opening to the 30th anniversary festival.
Cross Stephen Sommers The Mummy with Indiana Jones and add a touch of Asterix-style absurdity and you have The extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec.
It's fast, it's silly, it's dazzling and totally engaging. It's wonderful to see a big summer event movie that doesn't revolve around being a star vehicle.
Louise Bourgoin plays the eponymous heroine with effortless aplomb but she doesn't hog the camera and there's plenty of screen-time for a superb supporting cast. It's more of an ensemble film than a Hollywood film could ever be.
Luc Besson directs with tremendous, hyperactive bravura. Who else could have a pterodactyl swooping over the root-tops of Paris in 1911? The only slight disappointment was the standard of CGI when Adele was riding the pterodactyl. Maybe we have been spoiled over the years but some shots seemed more King King than Jurassic Park. Still this is a minor quibble. All in all, this was a wonderful opening to the 30th anniversary festival.
Review by on 17 Sep 2010
Fabulous. Beautifully subverts the normal film ideas about who the monsters should be and has a terrific female lead who deals wittily and ingeniously with all comers. Much more stylish and fun than Indiana Jones.
Review by on 17 Sep 2010
For someone who announced his retirement a few years ago, Luc Besson remains remarkably active.
This film is an adaptation a 1970s bande dessinée about the eponymous Adele, an Edwardian Lara Croft, with a touch of Tintin, in a turn of the century Paris, populated mainly by bumbling gentlemen with florid moustaches and ghastly haircuts. And, for reasons that become apparent as the film progresses, a rapacious pterodactyl which serves as the maguffin.
For a comedy adventure, the humour is uneven, sometimes leaden, sometimes a little too knowing (in the form of a certain quip about a change in the Parisian landscape that post-dates the original publication), but in the main, works.
Two strikes against the film -- an anachronistic attitude to tobacco (fixable by tweaking one line of dialogue), and two uses of bullet time.
Oh -- and you do have to stay through the credits for this one.
This film is an adaptation a 1970s bande dessinée about the eponymous Adele, an Edwardian Lara Croft, with a touch of Tintin, in a turn of the century Paris, populated mainly by bumbling gentlemen with florid moustaches and ghastly haircuts. And, for reasons that become apparent as the film progresses, a rapacious pterodactyl which serves as the maguffin.
For a comedy adventure, the humour is uneven, sometimes leaden, sometimes a little too knowing (in the form of a certain quip about a change in the Parisian landscape that post-dates the original publication), but in the main, works.
Two strikes against the film -- an anachronistic attitude to tobacco (fixable by tweaking one line of dialogue), and two uses of bullet time.
Oh -- and you do have to stay through the credits for this one.
Review by on 17 Sep 2010
This is a spirited and very funny romp, variously parodying and paying tribute to, amongst other things, everything from Spielberg to the phenomenon that is TOMB-RAIDER and the INDIANA JONES and JURASSIC PARK films, and it was a really brilliantly enjoyable choice for the start of the festival this year.
The title and the write-up in the festival booklet would lead one to expect no less, not least with the resonance that the French word ‘aventures’ has (I think that it is lacking in our similar English word), and that incongruously added to the heroine’s double-barrelled surname, which flagged up (if one translated it, even if one knew nothing (as I did) of Jacques Tardi) that we were to be prepared for the incredible passing calmly as the plausible (which some find convenient to call 'magical realism').
Besson brought his own kind of magic aplenty (which, for me, was already in the air – and very welcome – with the recent screening here of the delightful animation THE ILLUSIONIST), together with a mix that included a slightly gauche (but nevertheless engaging and helpful) nuclear physicist from the pre-Christian era, and an enjoyment of SFX that was only occasionally marred by what were (possibly quite deliberate) slight defects in the execution.
(For example, the heroine mounted a creature (not just a camel) bareback in a (successful) attempt to bring it to heel, and the seemingly unintended blurring that accompanied her return to earth with it subdued (and in harmony with her) could have been a way of undercutting our temptation ‘to believe’ too deeply in what was, essentially, a fable, charmingly distilled from the whole project’s origins in and indebtedness to the world of the illustrated page (and maybe to such films as DRAGONHEART and the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy). I have no doubt that some of the elements and themes were also more closely linked to that pictorial world than I, without other knowledge of it, could identify or fully appreciate, but such is the stuff of taking something from one medium to another (as with the Tati homage).
The film’s quirkiness and Egyptian theme were nicely set by the opening title-sequence, which turned out to be projected onto and panning across an obelisk that, when the edge was reached, at once brought us into focus on a familiar scene and set us in Paris. The Paris of 1911, as the initial and familiar technique of voiceover announced some important characters to be introduced to us in succession. And so their lives interacted (or, in the case of one who was asleep, failed to at that time), and brought us, via the (sometimes) hesitant character of Andrej to the start proper, with the artefact-exploring activities of the person to whom reviews traditionally like to refer as the eponymous female lead.
In stereotyping the villains who enter the tomb, one might be able to escape imputing the French-speaking racism towards its African empire to anything other than plot and period.
The title and the write-up in the festival booklet would lead one to expect no less, not least with the resonance that the French word ‘aventures’ has (I think that it is lacking in our similar English word), and that incongruously added to the heroine’s double-barrelled surname, which flagged up (if one translated it, even if one knew nothing (as I did) of Jacques Tardi) that we were to be prepared for the incredible passing calmly as the plausible (which some find convenient to call 'magical realism').
Besson brought his own kind of magic aplenty (which, for me, was already in the air – and very welcome – with the recent screening here of the delightful animation THE ILLUSIONIST), together with a mix that included a slightly gauche (but nevertheless engaging and helpful) nuclear physicist from the pre-Christian era, and an enjoyment of SFX that was only occasionally marred by what were (possibly quite deliberate) slight defects in the execution.
(For example, the heroine mounted a creature (not just a camel) bareback in a (successful) attempt to bring it to heel, and the seemingly unintended blurring that accompanied her return to earth with it subdued (and in harmony with her) could have been a way of undercutting our temptation ‘to believe’ too deeply in what was, essentially, a fable, charmingly distilled from the whole project’s origins in and indebtedness to the world of the illustrated page (and maybe to such films as DRAGONHEART and the LORD OF THE RINGS trilogy). I have no doubt that some of the elements and themes were also more closely linked to that pictorial world than I, without other knowledge of it, could identify or fully appreciate, but such is the stuff of taking something from one medium to another (as with the Tati homage).
The film’s quirkiness and Egyptian theme were nicely set by the opening title-sequence, which turned out to be projected onto and panning across an obelisk that, when the edge was reached, at once brought us into focus on a familiar scene and set us in Paris. The Paris of 1911, as the initial and familiar technique of voiceover announced some important characters to be introduced to us in succession. And so their lives interacted (or, in the case of one who was asleep, failed to at that time), and brought us, via the (sometimes) hesitant character of Andrej to the start proper, with the artefact-exploring activities of the person to whom reviews traditionally like to refer as the eponymous female lead.
In stereotyping the villains who enter the tomb, one might be able to escape imputing the French-speaking racism towards its African empire to anything other than plot and period.
Review by on 17 Sep 2010
Luc Besson's "Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec" was madcap, genre-defying, funny yarn. Very good start to festival.
Review by on 16 Sep 2010
A glorious romp through 1910s Paris full of wit and charm (and wise-cracking mummies!). Louise Bourgoin is excellent as the writer/adventurer Adèle Blanc-Sec, brashly charging her way from one escapade to the next. It's all a little farcical at times, but it's good humoured fun. I came out with a big smile on my face :-)
Film details
The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec
Director: Luc Besson
France, 2010.
105 mins. French with English subtitles.
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