When I read a novel i like to imagine the character's face, and I liked to see Sylvie Testud as Amelie. The movie is very close to the novel, and in my opinion a good adaptation. All the action takes place in the office of the powerful Yumimoto company, where Amelie gets a job and fails because, even if she is born in japan she is an occidental. Hired as an interpret she soon realize she has no work, except to serve coffee but she is an occidental, and fatality, she fails. The occidental brain is inferior to japanese one. In the end she becomes janitor in the 44th floor toilets.
The movie refers to "merry christmas Mr Lawrence"(named 'Furyo'), another good movie about the opposition between occident and orient. Here we have a different point of view. The poor Amelie tries to conform to japanese way of life, do her best but fails, and don't really understand why all goes wrong ( nor do the spectator, and this is the comic of the movie).
One can find the strict limitation to the office frustrating, as we don't know anything about Amelie's life outside. Well, In the novel Amelie Nothomb writes : this could be leading to think I had no life outside the office, which is wrong. but for a schizophrenic reason, when I was at job in the 44th floor toilets of the yumimoto company I couldn't think of myself as the same person respected and loved by friends outside.
For a similar reason, The other characters remain schematic. Mr Omoshi and Mr Saito are seen through Amelie's eyes as monsters, and we know she is lost and nobody tries to help her or to explain anything.
Even Fubuki is not very developed as a character. Amelie don't know anything about her real life, except she is 29, she works in the company for 7 years and she is too old to marry. But Amelie is a dreamer and she sees Fubuki as the perfect japanese girl, and her imagination leads her from the interpret job to the toilet cleaning...
Sorry, sometimes things are hard to explain, as english is not my natural language, but I think this movie was worth the try. Maybe it is not a masterpiece, but it lies among my favorites. My advice is to see the movie first, then read the novel ( and the other ones from Amelie Nothomb as well)
The movie refers to "merry christmas Mr Lawrence"(named 'Furyo'), another good movie about the opposition between occident and orient. Here we have a different point of view. The poor Amelie tries to conform to japanese way of life, do her best but fails, and don't really understand why all goes wrong ( nor do the spectator, and this is the comic of the movie).
One can find the strict limitation to the office frustrating, as we don't know anything about Amelie's life outside. Well, In the novel Amelie Nothomb writes : this could be leading to think I had no life outside the office, which is wrong. but for a schizophrenic reason, when I was at job in the 44th floor toilets of the yumimoto company I couldn't think of myself as the same person respected and loved by friends outside.
For a similar reason, The other characters remain schematic. Mr Omoshi and Mr Saito are seen through Amelie's eyes as monsters, and we know she is lost and nobody tries to help her or to explain anything.
Even Fubuki is not very developed as a character. Amelie don't know anything about her real life, except she is 29, she works in the company for 7 years and she is too old to marry. But Amelie is a dreamer and she sees Fubuki as the perfect japanese girl, and her imagination leads her from the interpret job to the toilet cleaning...
Sorry, sometimes things are hard to explain, as english is not my natural language, but I think this movie was worth the try. Maybe it is not a masterpiece, but it lies among my favorites. My advice is to see the movie first, then read the novel ( and the other ones from Amelie Nothomb as well)