Screenhead

Did you know that beloved French filmmaker Jacques Tati has his own website? It’s in both French and English. I found this out when I finally got around to seeing Tati’s first film which was recently made available on DVD from the British Film Institute.

Jour de Fete (Day of the Celebration) was shot in 1947 and released in 1949. Tati shot the film twice, once using an experimental color process called Thomsoncolor, and as back-up shot the film in black and white. The color process was so experimental that there was actually no way to strike color prints from that film! The black and white version was what the viewing public saw. The film was acclaimed first in England before gaining critical attention in France.

It was not until 1995 that a process was discovered which allowed for prints to be made from the original color negative. The DVD was created using Tati’s notes to present the film in as close a version as was intended almost sixty years ago.

By today’s standards, Jour de Fete is a very gentle comedy, with much of the humor coming from observing people. The action takes place in a small French village that is having an annual celebration. An old woman, often seen with her pet goat, comments on some of the activity. Tati appears as the village postman and has some of the biggest laughs with several slapstick moments, usually involving his bicycle. Gags include Tati’s riding his bike into the river, falling through some boards into a pit, and accidentally finding himself in a bicycle race.

Much of the value of Jour de Fete is seeing Tati develope his craft as a filmmaker who took several years with each film that he wrote, directed and starred in. The film isn’t as consistently funny as Mr. Hulot’s Holiday or Mon Oncle, but is worth seeing as Tati only made a handful of films, five theatrical features in a thirty year period.

The two films mentioned above should be seen by those unfamiliar with Tati. One of the bigger events for film lovers this year was the screening of Tati’s ambitious Playtime in 70mm last summer in San Francisco. Like many Tati fans, I’ve had to settle for seeing the cut 35mm version that was released in the U.S. At least the complete Playtime is also available on DVD.

Additionally, while checking on Tati’s filmography, I noticed that Sylvain Chomet, the man who made the animated Tripletts of Bellville has taken one of Tati’s unfilmed scripts, to be made into an animated feature scheduled for 2009 release. The title is The Illusionist which may possibly be changed to avoid confusion with the Edward Norton film that came out this year. Still this is exciting news for fans knowing that on the centennial anniversary of the birth of Jacques Tati, that they have not seen the last of the beloved Monsieur Hulot.

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