Cheap M. Hulot's Holiday - Criterion Collection (DVD) (Jacques Tati, Nathalie Pascaud) (Jacques Tati) Price

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Customer Reviews of M. Hulot's Holiday - Criterion Collection

While not as funny as I expected, M. Hulot's Holiday, is one of the most popular French comedies of the 1950's. It is directed by and stars Jaques Tati. The original French title is "Le Vacances de M. Hulot" The film is part of a quadrilogy 3 of which have been put on DVD by the Criterion Collection (as of July 2004).

The story follows Mr. Hulot, a very clumsy man who takes a vacation to an oceanfront hotel. While there he causes many different kinds of accidents ranging from a horse causing a car passenger to be stuck in the rumble seat to letting a load of fireworks to go off inside a shed.

There is much slapstick humor in the film also but does not even come close to the level attained in the Three Stooges short films. The film has a few sight gags also which are impressive.

The Criterion DVD includes an introduction by the writer, Terry Jones and includes the short film "Soigne ton gauche" or "look to your Left".

This DVD was out of print for a while and was rereleased in early 2004 The current edition is identical to the previous edition.

closely observed humanity
Firstly and most importantly this 2004 DVD is an exceptional production.
There certainly are cuts from the original but I am sure there are technical reasons only and not an artistic fiat from Criterion, who would have included every frame possible of the original - judging by their sensitive attention to the presentation of this version.
Now to those who haven't yet seen this film.
It is addictive. There is too much to absorb in a single viewing.
Tati allows you to stand on the other side of the room - or the other side of the street - or on the edge of the beach - and watch people being as human and funny as they always are, only you don't manage to catch all the details when you you are watching in real life because you don't like to stare.
Tati loves humanity. While his gentle, eccentric clown Hulot produces some of the funniest set pieces you are likely to see anywhere, let alone on film, there is the bonus that in every single scene in M Hulot's Holiday, all players provide a muted continuous backdrop of the immense range of eccentricity we are all capable of but never know we are displaying.
It is surely no accident that 'nuance' is a french word.
A masterpiece.

A Comedy of Memory
When I first saw "Les Vacances de Monsieur Hulot" many years ago, I couldn't understand what was the big deal. The film had its amusing moments - Hulot's Amilcar bouncing down the road and that tennis game! - but it seemed too slight for all the adjectives that critics had bestowed upon it.

After getting the DVD two years ago (before it was temporarily discontinued), I watched it again and saw an entirely different movie. The slightness that had bored me when I was teenager had changed into a feeling of wistfulness - the sense that we're watching a transient, quickly passing moment in people's lives. Tati's comedy, much more gentle than most American comedies, reveals itself only in multiple viewings. The film is more like a comic meditation on memory: how our all-too-brief periods of leisure open up and close possbilities for friendship, love, and other human interactions. This is a film to revisit again and again.