AniInterview Sorry, this movie sucks

Bea Swanson This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Mathilde the Guild Although I seem to have had higher expectations than I thought, the movie is super entertaining.

leethomas-11621 Whole tracts in which M. Hulot doesn't appear. Not as inspired as other Tati films. Main achievement is in precision and coordination of set-ups. Long takes are remarkably staged. Continuity of restaurant tableau is amazing. I would love to like this more, especially as whole enterprise bankrupted Tati. But by this stage Tati had been working with this genre and theme for 20 years so maybe he had said all he had to say. Amazingly, wardrobe, makeup, colours, etc. have not obviously aged except for odd hairstyle. Very classical look.

Ian (Flash Review)This film is about harmony vs dissonance; minimal, modern, uniformity and pattern. It is virtually a silent film with long takes which allow the viewer to notice everything from big to small in the frame. Overall, this an extremely stylish approach at highlighting the pitfalls of a hyper-modern society. There really is no plot aside from following a man named Mr. Hulot as he tries in vein to connect with some businessman. The first half was quirky Frenchness done to perfection with everything in a modern world portrayed in hyper-proper order accentuated by clever timing and striking cinematography. Yet Mr. Hulot is comically out of step with his surroundings; he's on the offbeat in this world. In contrast to the first half, the second half is full of dissonance. It focuses on an upscale restaurant's grand opening and everything that could go wrong, goes wrong yet the staff keeps their composure despite the absurdity of it all. It wasn't as funny or as visually stimulating as the first half. In fact it felt tedious at times and various gags were drawn out too long. Overall, the film is full of physical, light quirky humor and visually clever gags, where unrelated happenings are randomly in sync or in conflict. Many of the jokes were sound effect focused as the dialog was at most sparse. French at its most Frenchness.

souplipton Playtime is an intricately craft and incredibly directed comedy, with hundreds of moving parts in each scene resulting in an abundance of visual gags, often assisted by well timed sound effects. The camera keeps all the characters visible, and the deep focus ensures that we can see all of it at all times. The camera is expertly placed to frame the action in the exact way that is needed to produce the visual gags. Tati also manipulates the audio track, turning down the dialogue and turning up the effects. This guides the audience's attention to ensure that their focus is always where it needs to be in the very busy frame. However, though the film executes the gags perfectly (and should definitely be studied for how to fully utilize the medium for the sake of comedy), the gags are themselves not excessively funny. In some films this would not be the biggest issue, however, Playtime is a film built around these gags. Rarely presenting jokes in dialogue, and having the barest thread of a plot, Playtime has only its gags and its themes about modern life. The negative view of modern life and technology, arguing that they have taken the individuality out of the world, is one which has been presented in hundreds of other works, and is not enough to carry the film. Have nothing more than a banal theme and its plethora of flat (although admittedly well executed) gags, Playtime is an excellent film to study for its formal techniques, but nothing more.

Michel Polydor Playtime (1967), written and directed by Jacques Tati and probably one of his most brilliant films, is one of a kind, an amazingly funny movie that drives rather on incidents of comedic value than a funny dialogue-based script. A sign of Tati's craftsmanship in using the language of film in its true form.Playtime is set in Paris, or a Paris that still needs to exist in the future. At first sight the landmarks of the city seem to be excluded although, if we are fast, we can see the reflections of these landmarks in the reflections of the so modern (for its time) glass and steel constructions of the buildings. Upon watching this film you get a high sense of incidental chaos although everything is very structured and layered. The modern world created by Tati is a chaotic yet structured ballet of the people living in it. There is no plot, no main cast and almost no audible dialogue. Tati rather chooses for a script in the form of funny incidents. He controls the viewer and creates a game of observation. There's hardly any dialogue, and the dialogue that we get is mostly inaudible. The comedic relief comes from the nonstop flow of the visual gags that keep happening on screen, something that only Tati masters. These aren't laugh-out-loud gags, but smiles of recognition.As mentioned earlier there are no main character in this movie although some stand out more than others, for example his own Mr. Hulot, an attractive American woman or a restaurant owner. It is as if Tati tries to trick us with this kind of technique. As movie goers we are trained to find the main characters and we empathize with their emotions throughout the movie though this won't work watching Playtime. Sometimes you lose the 'main' characters and find them again walking around the corner. All these elements make Playtime a movie that begs to be watched more than once to fully appreciate the art that Tati has created. The cinematography of Jean Badal and Andréas Winding show us only the big picture of it all, instead of close ups or reaction shots. This particular style gives you the opportunity to search action at the screen wherever and whenever you want. As a viewer you are almost played at with a game of hide and seek, you constantly want to know what happens in the background, the forground and behind the camera lens. Tati draws a strong contrast between humans, hopeful, and wondering through the impersonal and modern cities of the future. We see all these things happening before our eyes, not from someone's point of view but rather through the lens of the camera. Tati gives the movie goer the opportunity to make their own assumptions of the world he created. Although you can feel that the comedic touch of the film is actually his reaction towards these modern societies, the loss of a more personal city. Although the high production costs bankrupted Tati, Playtime is undoubtedly a magical and funny masterpiece that still holds up to its time. It shows that Tati is an artist as a physical comedy actor and visionary director.