Jour De Fete (1949) (Import)

Jacques Tati's award-winning feature debut - a dazzling blend of satire and slapstick - was early evidence of his unique talent. Acclaimed by international critics as an innovative comic masterpiece, Jour de Fete is an hilarious expose of the modern obsession with speed and efficiency, set amidst the rural surroundings of a tiny French village. Tati plays an appealingly self-deluded buffoon, Francois - a postman who, impressed by the bristling efficiency of the U.S. postal system, makes a wholly misguided attempt to introduce modern methods in the depths of rural France. Initially released in black and white, but also shot in Thomsoncolor, an untested colour process, the film has been restored and is finally available in its original delicate colour. Jour de Fete was shot in the summer of 1947 in the little town of Sainte-Severe-sur-Indre in the Berry region of France, some 200 km south of Paris. The film was an expansion of the 15-minute short, L'Ecole des Facteurs, that Tati had made the previous year, and almost all the gags in the short are recycled into the longer film. Tati's antics on his wayward bike are endlessly inventive and the film also serves as an affectionate, gently mocking tribute to a vanishing way of life. Francois' brief infatuation with 'American' methods of speed and efficiency prefigures the satire on modernity that Tati would go on develop in Mon Oncle (1958) and Playtime (1967). Jour de Fete at first aroused little interest among French distributors. Not until after its London premiere in March 1949, when it got good reviews and went on general release, did the French industry sit up and take notice. It won a prize for 'best scenario' at the Venice Film Festival, and in 1950 it was awarded the 'Grand Prix du Cinema Francais'.