Culture

Rating: 4/5

Let me start by saying that I haven’t enjoyed a film this much in a really long time, which is high praise indeed considering it was my fourth Film Festival movie in a week. Whimsical, surreal and heart-breaking, it was everything you’d expect from Michel Gondry, the director behind the equally magical Science of Sleep and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

Mood Indigo’s opening scene made me want to do an aggressive and spirited dance routine of joy in the cinema, as I was so overwhelmed with happiness I felt it required a physical outlet. The audience all watched with smiles plastered on their faces as our hero Colin (Romain Duris) starts off his day: he sings in the shower, dines on a breakfast prepared by his personal chef and legal consultant Nicholas (Omar Sy) and hears of the romantic conquests of his best friend Chick (Gad Elmaleh). However, it is worth mentioning that the door bell climbed up the wall like a spider, Nicholas prepared the meal with help from a TV chef that spoke directly to him (even passing spices through the TV screen), and Colin cut off his eye-lids, which were then collected by his residential mouse (a miniature middle aged man in a mouse costume). It was immediately apparent that you weren’t in the real world anymore – you were in a Gondry world.

The story truly takes flight when, after hearing of Nicholas and Chick’s new girlfriends, Colin proclaims: “I demand to fall in love!” Luckily, Nicholas and Chick know just the right girl, and that very night he is introduced to Chloe (Audrey Tatou) at a birthday party for a poodle. Shopping, ice skating and general frolicking ensues and you never want the fun to end. But it does. Like a hatchet to the back.

If the first hour of the film was the most joyous I have ever witnessed, the second hour was the most bleak. The world is still surreal, but in the most depressing way: one of Colin’s many miserable jobs is to lie naked on a mound of dirt so that his human warmth can power the creation of military guns. (The weapons his warmth powers are useless, however, as he’s too sad.) The film is currently sitting on two stars out of five on Rotten Tomatoes and I think this is why – it gets incredibly dark incredibly quickly. For me, this wasn’t a problem. The first half of Mood Indigo is so slap-you-in-the-face happy that it gives the sadness beauty and meaning, and the characters’ fall into destruction, depression and personal ruin is made all the more poignant.

The actors do the most splendid job of bringing truth to characters that live in a bizarre and magical world. As always, Tatou is a class act, and no one could have been better suited for the role of Colin as the charismatic, cheeky and often child-like Duris. For me, Omar Sy (of the much-loved Intouchables) is a personal highlight – he brings his trademark charm and cool to the unusual happenings around him. It also helps that the cast are more attractive than anyone you’ll ever see or meet in your real life; in fact the character of Isis (played by French supermodel Charlotte Le Bon) is so beautiful that I actually got angry when subtitles came onto the screen, as it meant I had to drag my eyes away from her astonishing face.

The only reason this film isn’t a 5/5 is because of the ending – if that’s Gondry’s statement on life then I’m not buying it. But you can enjoy the film without buying into its grand statement. Let yourself be engulfed by this incredible, fantastical, tragic world. You won’t regret it.