Delicatessen (1991) User Reviews (214)

One most inventive and original films to grace the silver screen

[The_Void · 8/10 · 9 September 2004]

Delicatessen is hard to pin down under a specific genre label; it's a surreal black comedy, a human drama, a post-apocalyptic horror movie, a twisted thriller, a futuristic fantasy; and all in all; one of the strangest and most original films I've ever seen.

In this fantasy world, the world has been ravaged and food is now in short supply. This has therefore made food invaluable and it is being used as currency. Things are traded for with grain, corn and lentils, but not everyone can afford the luxury of food, and some have had to resort to cannibalism to continue to enjoy eating. Our scene opens at a delicatessen in an unspecified location in France, and we are treated to an absolutely delicious sequence (no pun intended) in which a man is desperately trying to hide himself in the trash can. We later find that the reason for this is that this particular delicatessen hires handymen and keeps them long enough to fatten them up, and then they are eaten by the delicatessen's butcher and the inhabitants of the apartment building in which they live. The story really gets going when an ex-clown turns up at the shop, wanting the handyman's job, which has...become available. The plot thickens when the new handyman meets, and later falls in love with, the butcher's daughter; Julie. Julie knows what goes on at the delicatessen and can't allow her new found love to meet the same fate as the others, and therefore does the only thing she can do; hire a band of vegetarian freedom fighters to save her love from becoming dinner for the butcher and his customers.

Delicatessen is directed by the team of Marc Caro (whom, I'm afraid, I am unfamiliar with) and the more well known Jean-Pierre Jeunet, director of a few lesser known modern classics, but best known for the enthusiastic 'Amelie'. The film is brought to life by a brilliant ensemble cast. Dominique Pinon (who also featured in Jeunet's Amelie, Alien 4 and City of Lost Children) takes the lead role of the clown turned handyman. His performance is both understated and magical; as he simultaneously manages to entice the viewer into his performance, and yet keeps his character in the realms of reality (a place in which this film doesn't take place). Jean-Claude Dreyfus is the real star of the show, however, as the extroverted and over the top butcher. His performance certainly isn't subdued, to say the least; and every moment that he is on screen is a delight. In a stark contrast to Dreyfus, Marie-Laure Dougnac; the young lady that plays his daughter and love interest for Pinon is very down to earth, and is the most 'normal' character in the film...although there's still room for her to be a nearly blind klutz. The rest of the ensemble comes together excellently, and not a single actor in the film performs below par or looks out of place; and there's not many films that you can say that for.

This film isn't quite like anything else I've ever seen. In fact, the only film I can think of that is similar to this is Terry Gilliam's futuristic fantasy; Brazil. The film draws it's originality from it's plot mainly, which is extremely surreal and inventive in itself, but it's not just that which makes Delicatessen one of a kind; it's all the smaller plot points. How many films do you know that feature a bullshit detector? (that is set off when the butcher tells it that "life is wonderful", no less). The way that the film looks is also wonderfully different; Delicatessen has a yellow hue, which lends it a style that is very dull and dreary; and that does the film no end of favours when you consider it's core subject material. The yellow hue also makes the film almost feel like a moving comic book, which is one of the things that gives the film it's surreal and absurd edge. I'm a big fan of atmospheric films, which is one of the main reasons why I like horror so much; and this film also has an atmosphere like no other. It's the way that the yellow-ish buildings look next to the dark skyline, and the way that the film uses darkness and smoke to make it more horrifying (see roof sequence towards the end) that gives this film the finishing touch to it's already distinct style.

The love story in the film is sweet and tender, and this very much offsets the dark overtones of the rest of the film. This is nice, as during the scenes between the clown (Pinon) and Julie (Dougnac), the film allows itself to indulge in humour that isn't dark like the rest of the film, and you get the impression that it's enjoying itself a little more. This is just another thing in a long line of great things that make Delicatessen a great movie. Another of these things is the more minor characters. I have never seen a more motley crew than the one in this film. As previously mentioned, Julie, although not entirely 'normal', is the most normal character in the film; the rest of it is populated by lunatics. There's a man with a house full of frogs, a woman that continually tries to commit suicide, a man that puts cans on his deaf mother in law so they know where she is etc. The support cast's wackiness don't add anything much to the story itself (which only really requires them to be there), but the fact that they are different and imaginative is another of the film's absurd edges, and another thing that makes this film different from everything else.

Delicatessen concentrates more on being absurd and surreal than it does in posing deep and philosophical questions. Personally, I have no problem with that, but those who do want a movie to be deep and meaningful might find the film disappointing because of that. That is not to say that the film completely lacks depth or meaning; although a moral to the story doesn't seem to present itself, the film takes it's depth from the 'what if' scenario that it presents; "if the world's food supply became too short to feed the population, would you resort to cannibalism or join the vegetarian freedom fighters?". It's a very general message; but it's definitely there.

Overall, Delicatessen is a sublime piece of cinema. You wont find imagination and inventiveness to the extent that it is shown here in most films, and that alone is reason enough to warrant this classic status. Delicatessen is everything I say it is and more; and overall the film is one of the true highlights of the 1990's. A gem.

Inventive, stylish and darkly amusing

[JBLOSS · 9/10 · 25 June 2001]

This is a superb film. The look and design of the sets is unique and the narrative is certainly original!! I would place this film along with others like Being John Malkovich as it really did make me sit up and take notice. There are some truly great set pieces in the film particularly when the whole house starts to get into the same rhythm as the love makers on the top floor ( ripped off by an American Beer company I note in an advert ) and the botched suicide attempt too - hey I said it is darkly amusing!! I would say that there is not a weak performance amongst the cast in this evocative tale of futuristic cannibalism!! Basically, trying to describe this film makes it sound too bizarre but I highly recommend it to anyone who likes originality and their humour on the edge of darkness.

The brilliant debut of Caro & Jeunet

[jluis1984 · 8/10 · 15 January 2007]

In the late 70s, french director Jean-Pierre Jeunet and designer Marc Caro met and found they shared a lot of interests in the visual arts, their friendship soon became an artistic team that would spent the whole 80s making short films where the duo was able to explore and master the cinema language, perfecting their storytelling abilities and visual design skills, preparing themselves to make a career in film-making. Their efforts were crowned in 1991, when they were finally able to take their craft to a full feature length film, in the project that would become their breakthrough in the film industry and the proper beginning of their careers as filmmakers: the post-apocalyptic comedy "Delicatessen".

The world of "Delicatessen" is a dark bleak France where there is apparently no law and food is incredibly sparse (and is now used as currency). In this post-apocalyptic world, the residents of an apartment building in the middle of nowhere have found a solution to the hunger thanks to their landlord, the butcher Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus), who from time to time kills the building's handyman to feed the bizarre group of tenants. One day, former clown Louison (Dominique Pinon) arrives to the building and gets the handyman position, but unfortunately for Clapet and the other tenants, the butcher's daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac) has fallen in love with Louison, and will do whatever is necessary to stop the madness of the delicatessen.

Written by Gilles Adrien (who also wrote many of the previous Jeunet & Caro shorts) as well as Jeunet & Caro themselves, "Delicatessen" is a wonderfully imaginative tale of sweet romance and hilarious black comedy that gives an unexpected light-hearted twist to a plot that most writers would treat as a serious subject matter. And surprisingly it works, as while the story is anything but complex, the assortment of strange (yet very human) characters that populate the world of "Delicatessen" truly become the movie's soul. And not only the main characters, as every single one of them (no matter how small the role is) is highly detailed and serves a specific function as if the whole building was one of the odd machines that still work in this post-apocalyptic portrait of France.

Visually, the film is simply sublime. Since the directors decided to divide responsibilities, Marc Caro took full control of the production design and the artistic elements of the movie, so with this freedom Caro's inventive artistic vision reaches new heights creating a movie that could be described as a moving canvas. Highly atmospheric, the french duo takes the cinematography (by Darius Khondji) to the next level mixing techniques and showing a whole range of influences that go from German Expressionism to 40s modernism, resulting in one of the most beautiful looking movies ever done. Still, the movie is more than a visual fest, as Jeunet (in charge of guiding the actors) shows a complete domain over his cast & crew keeping the many elements of the film working nicely in the right place.

As written above, the characters are the film's soul, and the ensemble of actors playing them really made a terrific job in the film. Dominique Pinon (who would become one of Jeunet's regular collaborators) delivers a subtle and charming performance as the ex-clown Louison. He is very believable in the role, and gives the character a very human touch, essential for the kind of character he is playing. The same can be said of Marie-Laure Dougnac, who plays Louison's love interest, Julie, one of the "more normal" characters in the movie. Jean-Claude Dreyfus as Clapet the Butcher is simply delightful as the story's "villian", and basically every member of the cast delivers an unforgettable performance no matter how long or short is their screen time (Silvie Laguna for example, is really wonderful).

"Delicatessen" is a solid debut by this two skillful french artists, and it already shows why the two quickly became an important team in the French fantasy cinema. Their very own brand of surrealist fantasy flows freely through the film making a unique visual fest (although it definitely goes a bit over-the-top at times), and while it doesn't reach the artistic level of their follow-up (the 1995 classic "La Cité Des Enfants Perdus"), it's still a nicely done movie that most importantly, never gets boring or tiresome. Unlike their later films, "Delicatessen" may not be for everyone, as it's mix of black comedy and surreal fantasy may seem at times too close to absurd to be enjoyable. However, those with a taste for the bizarre will find a great movie in this French comedy.

While "Delicatessen" still shows the excess of the young and raw talent of Jeunet & Caro, it's not hard to see why they became known worldwide after this initial success, as this movie shows the enormous potential of their skills as filmmakers. This brilliant mixture of genres is definitely a very recommended movie, and like "La Cité Des Enfants Perdus" ("City of the Lost Children"), an essential film of the 90s. 8/10

Masterpiece

[imdb-3362 · 10/10 · 15 October 2004]

If Citizen Kane is the number one movie to see to learn anything about cinematography, this might as well be at number 2.

Delicatessen succeeds at creating a totally separate, consistent and believable universe with a very distinct atmosphere. The brown and green colors add to the weirdness of this universe.

Is it horror? Yes and no. Is it a comedy? Yes and no. Is it brilliant? Oh yes!

Everybody involved in the making of this picture gave it its best. The camera work is brilliant, the sets are simply amazing (with the final bathroom scene at the pinnacle), the editing and pace is breathtaking.

This could have been a very dark movie (and I guess a few Hollywood directors would have tried to turn it into a splatter movie and fail miserably), but the humor is just light, off-beat and hilarious enough to make it into a consistent and bearable whole. Every universe has its humor, and a strange universe has strange humor. Jacques Tati would have loved Delicatessen.

Julie's 'tea ceremony' without her glasses, the mattress spring test, Aurore's failing suicide contraptions, it's all funny as hell. I hope everyone who is even marginally involved in making movies gets to see Delicatessen and learns from its greatness. We could sure use a touch of genius in most of them ...

10/10

absolutely riveting!!!!

[postmanwhoalwaysringstwice · 10/10 · 10 October 2006]

Melding the perfect mixture of the visual grace of a silent film with a modern soundscape and bearing a twenty-first century post-apocalyptic sardonic sense of humor, Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro's "Delicatessen" becomes one of the finest contemporary films.

This pitch black comedy delves into cannibalism and oddball romance in the same breath with equal gusto and therefore feels horrific, humorous, and haunting all at once. Every frame is a wonder of detail and originality that reinvigorates even the most jaded and long-time film viewer with the sense of rediscovering the art form. This is film-making in the highest regard worthy of praise, awe, and multiple viewings.

Original movie from the director of 'Amelie'

[rbverhoef · 7/10 · 30 May 2004]

'Delicatessen' is a very original comedy from Jean-Pierre Jeunet, who also directed the great 'Amélie'. It tells the story of Louison (Dominique Pinon) who is the new helper of a landlord named Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus). Clapet is a butcher and in a world where food is rare he prepares cannibalistic meals for the people in his building. Louison is the new meal and the people in the building wait for Clapet to kill him so they can eat. Clapet's daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac) falls in love with Louison and to save him she seeks help from an underground group.

You have read the above and you must understand 'Delicatessen' is not a normal movie. Although its subject is close to very scary the movie is a comedy and to be honest it is very funny at times. Listen to the way people talk here. Especially the conversation between the butcher and a mailman is very funny. The underground group gets a lot of laughs as well. The movie hints at real horror images but never gives us that. Most of the time the tension is broken with something funny.

'Delicatessen' is not only pretty funny, it looks terrific as well. From the great opening sequence to the last shot it is visually perfect. The production design and especially the cinematography add a lot to the movie's whole atmosphere. May be it is not for everyone, some will find it ridiculous or the idea too lugubrious, may be it is, but the way the subject is handled is the right way. At least it is interesting and therefore already worth seeing.

Perfect for My Tastes

[BrandtSponseller · 10/10 · 24 January 2005]

Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) is a butcher who runs the generically named "Delicatessen" housed in a bombed-out looking apartment building filled to the brim with eccentrics. Since food is scarce in the film's world, Clapet has devised a scheme to provide himself and his tenants with a regular supply of meat--he runs ads in the local paper for handymen, and after they fix a few things on the building, they become the main course. When the film begins, we see a man who tries unsuccessfully to escape. The bulk of the film is the story of Stan Luison (Dominique Pinon), who is the latest person to answer Clapet's advertisement.

This film is definitely an acquired taste, so to speak. I've acquired the taste, and for me, it's a 10 out of 10. Delicatessen is set in a weird, post-apocalyptic, alternate universe that is not entirely dissimilar to the setting of Terry Gilliam's Brazil (1985)--in fact, this could very easily be the same world as Brazil, just that that film is situated in its titular locale, and this would be a less fashionable section of France. Like Brazil, most of the production design--the costumes, music, television programming, etc.--suggests an historic setting, say about the 1940s, but it also seems to be set in the future, or at least an alternate present.

In place of Brazil's elaborate, chaotic technology, directors Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet have created a multi-leveled Rube Goldberg construction. Goldberg was an American cartoonist and sculptor known for drawings of incredibly complex contraptions that often performed simple tasks. This recurs from small scales--the interconnected tubes in the building and the uses of the "Australian", to medium scales—Aurore Interligator's (Silvie Laguna) attempted suicide set-ups, to the grand scale of the film, where each character, or set of characters, is interlocking in different ways that has a small, but complex causal effect on the whole. Sometimes, these concatenations are more simultaneous than causal, as in the ingenious "bedspring symphony" near the beginning of the film.

Appropriate to its ultimate subject matter, the visuals are focused on decay and dinginess. The delicatessen is filthy and the apartment building is falling apart. The tenants own a lot of broken things, and for those things that aren't broken, there's a good chance they'll get broken as the film progresses. (And by the way, if you love the production design and atmosphere of the film, and wouldn't mind seeing something with a similar mood, but serious instead of a surrealistic "black comedy" like Delicatessen, check out David Cronenberg's Spider (2002)).

All the tenants have various eccentricities, often involving food. One of the most interesting tenants is an old man who decided to harvest his own meals by turning his apartment into a swamp, via regularly running water flooding the apartment, and inhabited by frogs and snails. He has a huge pile of empty snail shells stacking up in a corner. Water is a motif in the film--probably because of its relationship to food, as a means of necessary nourishment, although ironically, in a world characterized by food shortages, water is mostly wasted in the film.

While not a depressing film (it wasn't to me, at least, although not that I dislike "depressing" films), Delicatessen isn't exactly uplifting, either, although there is a message of hope at the end, I suppose. It's definitely not for all audiences, but if you're a fan of Gilliam, Cronenberg, David Lynch, and similar directors, you should definitely try a meal at this Delicatessen.

A sublime fusion of sickening grotesquerie and sentimental clowning.

[praemius · 16 September 2000]

Jeunet and Caro, with the help of their familiar repertory of actors, create a deeply disturbing and violent world where only a few shreds of conventional social mores remain. These scraps of morality only serve to delineate more clearly the overall decline and collapse of their dystopia. We see a butcher's shop; the proprietor, played by Jean-Claude Dreyfus, is evil almost to the point of caricature. He only manages to survive by killing his lodgers when they get behind with the rent and selling them as meat. However, the situation is given an added twist when we learn that all the lodgers are aware of this; a woman who is sold a joint of mother sheds a couple of stifled tears and mutters she would have liked to have said goodbye. Similarly, the butcher is most apologetic when he accidentally chops off the foot of one of his clients who has paid his rent in full.

Into this hellish world is placed someone with his moral values relatively intact. In this case, it is a circus performer played by the marvellously rubber-faced Dominique Pinon. A less engaging actor might have made this character seem two-dimensional, as he appears to have no faults whatsoever (except a set of over-mobile lips). He enthrals the lodgers' children with his games, is immensely chivalrous to the butcher's daughter and plays the musical saw. Finally, an old edition of his act is broadcast on the flickering black-and-white television, and even the most bloodthirsty lodgers are amazed and delighted. The butcher's jealousy is roused; Good and Innocence is forced to fight Evil and Hatred.

As such, the plot is relatively straightforward. It is the sheer surrealistic imagination that Jeunet and Caro bring to their films that prevent them being unremittingly bleak or simple morality tales. They display a brilliant sense of musical timing- the whole building frequently becomes an orchestra of creaking bed-springs, croaking frogs, and crackling radios; above all this soars a love-duet of a cello and a musical saw. The faded `look' of the film complements this. With the exception of a single television remote control, nothing here would be out of place in in a exhibition of 40s and 50s design. In `The City of Lost Children' the exuberance of the design threatens to swamp the slender storyline on occasions; here, the more `grown-up' themes and less fantastic design go hand in hand.

(A word of warning about the video release- the subtitles appear to have been written be a couple of Frenchmen who really ought to have concentrated harder in their English classes at school. Apart from that, I wholeheartedly recommend this joyously grotesque film.)

a very French apocalypse

[SnoopyStyle · 7/10 · 5 November 2015]

In the post-apocalyptic France, food is scarce. Clapet (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) is the landlord of an apartment building and the downstairs delicatessen butcher. Circus clown Louison (Dominique Pinon) gets the job of butcher's assistant and falls in love with the butcher's daughter Julie (Marie-Laure Dougnac). Clapet intends to cut up the new worker for food and Julie contacts vegetarian underground rebel Troglodistes.

I like the weird French idea of the apocalypse. Of course, it's about food and cuisine. The yellowy tint is a little off-putting. The style is Gilliam-esque which I love. All the characters are weird. The Troglodistes are even weirder. I like the love story but the movie dwells too much on the weirdness.

An often ingenious, always entertaining cult favorite from France.

[capkronos · 9/10 · 9 July 2003]

If you think the cannibal movie subgenre has been milked dry... think again! This one will have you from the opening credits. It's set in a crumbling apartment building in 21st century, post-apocalyptic Paris where food is at a minimum, grains are used as money and the butcher downstairs runs a black-market deli providing clientel with what seems to be the only meat product available, and it ain't chicken.

Dominique Pinon is an ex-circus clown who answers a personal ad doing odd jobs there and encounters assorted weirdos while being targeted as the main course. There's a noncomformist who eats snails and frogs, a band of grimy cave-dwelling looters, an unhinged woman whose botched suicide attempts are comic highlights and an amazing musical sequence featuring a cello, creaky bed springs, machinery, drills and other noises combining to create a symphony of sounds.

The oppressive atmosphere and murky brown color schemes could have easily turned this into a dreary disaster, but the directors keep it offbeat, surprising and clever throughout, and don't miss their chance to throw in some inventive black comedy.

A fiendish delight

[LCShackley · 7/10 · 23 June 2007]

Being a big fan of Jeunet's more recent films, I was happy to find this one on cable last week. I found myself chuckling through the whole thing; not just at the jokes, but at the painstaking way Jeunet and Caro plant plot, scenic, and sound details that later play important parts in the film. (They even took time for things like designing and filming one of the cleverest opening credit sequences I've seen.) Jeunet's films are a feast of color and sound, where almost every character is memorable in his/her own way.

The plot is simple, but why complain? The directors have created an entire world for us to enjoy, filled with quirky people (the suicide woman, the guys who make animal-noisemakers...for whom?), weird set design (there must be a plumbing fetishist on the crew), and painstakingly-created set pieces (the flood, the fight on the roof, the squeaky bed). Relax and let your eyes and ears be dazzled by this offbeat comic romance.

The cornerstone of originality

[Dockelektro · 8/10 · 23 July 2002]

Clever ideas and good notion of filmmaking are at the core of this movie, whose storyline is the smallest asset. But you won't really care when you see it, because even though the story isn't really elaborate, what you have here is one of the most original movies you'll ever get your eyes on. The setting is perfect, with no historic or geographic references, only an estranged building, which doesn't have a single straight normal tenant. The result is a magnificent work of actors, cinematography and set dressing, that makes the most of visual resources for a movie. The directors Jeunet & Caro show their true potential in this movie that will keep you glued with its naive-like comedy style, and its unique set of characters, which could generate a separate movie about each and every one of them. Magnificent, and truly original.

A really good yet strange french film

[SeptumSin · 7/10 · 11 September 2008]

Not since "The City of Lost Children" have I been so curious about a film.

This film takes place in the after a war of some sort leaving the world in shambles. A traveling man ends up taking work at a rather shady Delicatessen doing odd jobs. The movie then goes to apartment life examining the different traits of the tenants. Well our traveling man ends up going across the wrong path attempting to hook up with the Butcher's daughter...and so the life of danger begins.

Well this movie is much like "The city of lost children" in that the background is so interesting that it tends to take from most of the film...yet the characters also hold that interest. The biggest issue I have from the film is that the characters and background tend to outshine the story itself. Otherwise I can say that this is a truly wonderful film that I'd love to watch a second time. Be wary though the language is french only.

French-style grotesque surrealism, in a film with style but no content.

[filipemanuelneto · 4/10 · 14 May 2023]

I think I got to know Jean-Pierre Jeunet in the same way as almost everyone who doesn't follow French cinema at the same time: through the film "Amelie". The film brought the director international and is unanimously considered his greatest and most relevant work. Given how much I liked this movie, I decided to see this one, but my experience was different. If "Amelie" was magical and beautiful, this film is much more uninteresting. It was treated like a surreal nightmare: it's a story about a butcher who occasionally sells human flesh in a dystopian future.

Regardless of how much I felt disgusted by the aesthetics adopted in the film and by its bizarre theme, there is no doubt that it was a work with notes of quality: the degradation of buildings and the environment symbolizes or synthesizes the degradation of morals and values. The cacophony of sounds and images, between the dreamlike and the grotesque, is purposeful and intense (for example, that moment when the sound of bed springs where a couple makes love mixes with the sounds of a girl practicing the cello or from another neighbor who paints the ceiling of his apartment). The director's marks of talent, the quality we saw in "Amelie" is here, but distorted and adapted to a much less sympathetic film project.

The film has good actors and the performance of each of them helps the film to become a little more palatable. Dominique Pinon stood out the most: he knows how to balance between seriousness and hilarity and has a body and facial expressiveness that is remarkable. Jean Claude Dreyfus also deserves a positive note, while Marie-Laure Dougnac doesn't seem to me to have anything relevant to do other than appear ethereal, diaphanous as a mirage.

Being a film that cares more about style than content, it also presents us with a very sharp and stylized cinematography: I must say that I admired the camera angles and the filming work, quite original, but that I don't particularly like the color, where an ocher tone made the film excessively brown. And despite the efforts, the soundtrack is one of those innocuous elements, which neither enhances nor harms the film because it does not deserve our attention in a relevant way.

Stunning!

[The One · 10/10 · 20 February 1999]

I watched this movie on dirty heads, so the picture was continually jumping. This disappointed the people I was watching it with, so they left. This did not stop me, however, from watching and, in turn, loving this beatiful piece of cinematic masterpiece. I am a huge fan of any movie (or thing) that is off-centre, and not-quite-right. "Delicatessen" fits this perfectly with its distorted camera angles and equally distorted characters. Jeunet and Caro have made one of the best movies ever!

very dark but gloriously absurd

[toast-15 · 8/10 · 15 September 2011]

Almost from the start, with the closeups of fat faces in very strange expressions, I sensed that I had seen the style elsewhere. Then I realized that this movie reminded me of Amelie. Sure enough, it is the same director although this was made about a decade earlier. Amelie is one of my favorite movies; not just for the story but also for the unique imagery. This movie shares that unique visual style but in a more grotesque fashion. Faces are shown in closeup that border on nightmarish. Colors and atmosphere meld to form a bleak, murky, misty and dreary filmscape. It is at once charming and horrifying. One of my favorite scenes is when Louison (Dominique Pinon) is blowing bubbles in the hallway. The two mischievous boys (or "young rascals" played by Boban Janevski and Mikael Todde) are immediately entranced and Louison is spared from any future harassment from them. Indeed, at one point they save his life with their mischief on others. Another of my favorite scenes is when Louison and Juliet (Marie-Loure Dougnat) are playing a duet, she on the cello, he on the saw(?!). Together with the music it was a magic moment. In fact, whenever Louison is shown clowning around, the music is soft and whimsical. Another wonderful moment is when Louison and the Butcher's lover (Karin Viard) are unintentionally playing a song from squeaky mattress springs. In another scene, she and Louison are dancing in his apartment. It looks well enough until you notice that Louison has 3 legs giving new meaning to having 2 left feet. These delightful moments are a stark contrast to the rest of the film. I guess I should expound on what the movie is about.

Louison is an out of work clown whose partner has been eaten. He tries to get a job as a handyman for a butcher (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) who is also a tenement owner. The butcher sizes him up and is not sure he will do. He thinks Louison is a bit too scrawny. However, Louison's luggage is all over the street so he gets the job just to clear the way. It would have been better had he not because in an earlier scene, you see someone hiding in a trash can and then getting butchered as the screen goes black. That someone was the last handyman. This movie is set in a post apocalyptic future where food is scarce and indeed, grain has become currency. The world has become divided between those that live underground and still use grain as food instead of currency and those that hoard grain and eat... well, anything else they can get their hands on except grain. I don't think I've ever seen a blacker comedy than this but if you enjoyed Amelie, I think you will also like this movie.

Mind-blowing, inventive comedy

[pooch-8 · 25 February 1999]

Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro crafted a near-perfect film in Delicatessen, an almost indescribably unique French comedy concerning cannibalism, troglodytes, a circus clown, myopia, suicide, and sex -- and it's all set following some kind of apocalyptic catastrophe. An extraordinary group of actors (with faces worthy of Fellini) play the desperate residents of an apartment where one's next meal could literally be the neighbor from down the hall. The elastic-featured Dominique Pinon, as the clown turned handyman, is a joy to watch. Delicatessen is packed with Rube Goldberg-style set-pieces (I especially love the fixing of the bed spring as well as the rooftop battle during the television broadcast) that leave you breathless.

Darkly amusing

[greg-armshaw · 7/10 · 11 September 2006]

Wonderful film. Right from the DVD options sequence and excellent credits this film delights. The rich atmosphere of the wonderful sets and glorious characterization are a joy. The house above the butchers shop is a wonderful symphony of the bizarre. The box-spring testing scene is an all time classic - very funny. If my memory serves me correctly it is kind of a cross between Little shop of Horrors and Sweeney Todd. A Futuristic theme with a feel of yesteryear. Beneath this is a simple plot and a sweet love story.

Up there with Jamon Jamon for craziness.

Watch out for the Trogladytes!

Love for detail shows at every turn

[mhi · 10/10 · 14 September 2000]

Jeunet & Caro have created a masterpiece. While certainly this film will not be everyone's cup of tea, I cannot recall anyone I know seeing it and not being delighted. No other movie I've seen so far could top this one for its combination of wittiness, dark humor, love for detail and collection of regular people holding a mirror up to each and everyone of us, showing us how strange we really are.

Indeed this movie will not be constrained by a classification as romance, comedy or science fiction or horror. It is much more than the sum of these - it is a work of art and the painstaking work and love for detail which Jeunet & Caro have put into it show everywhere you look.

This movie is definitely off-beat and I definitely love it!

Slice it thick and juicy, Bon appétit

[Bigweight66 · 7/10 · 25 December 2020]

Quite an odd movie, best described as a black comedy. It's kind of hard to pin down what time frame this movie is set in, and what has become of society? Food is in short supply and is on everyone's mind. A menacing butcher who is also a landlord in a run down apartment block, serves his tenants, both over the counter and on the chopping block. The apartments are occupied by a weird and quirky bunch of tenants. One of the tenants is the butchers fragile daughter, who takes an interest in the new handy man. The handy man is an out of work clown, who might be the most normal person in the apartment block? His biggest challenge is to stay away from the butchers chopping block! The scenery and settings are dark and hazy, which compliment the dark story. I found the movie somewhat slow in the first 30 minutes, I was tempted to turn it off. However it gets better as it goes along, so I'm glad I watched the whole thing. I'm not exactly sure what I watched but? For a few reasons, it's a movie not easily forgotten.

Quite good. But it gets better.

[rooprect · 9/10 · 16 July 2005]

My dad hated this movie. All I can say is: if you like the style, you'll like the movie. If not, you'll hate it.

Now let's describe the style. The Jeunet/Caro team has been compared to Terry Gilliam (BRAZIL, 12 MONKEYS, etc). That's pretty fair, but Jeunet/Caro add a fresh innocence that's not present in Gilliam's apocalyptic visions. True, DELICATESSEN is dark, morbid, and sarcastic at times, but there are also moments of pure beauty that shine through. A scene comes to mind where Dominique Pinon is blowing soap bubbles for a pair of mesmerized children. Beautiful.

And so goes a recurring theme of Jeunet/Caro's work - that in the midst of horror, beauty can exist. My only gripe with the film is that it got a little silly in the last half. The zany antics of the "terrorists" distracted from the profound meaning of the piece.

But here's where it gets better. I believe Jeunet/Caro perfected their art over the next few years and ultimately created the masterpiece CITY OF LOST CHILDREN. Fantasy doesn't get any better than that one, folks. I believe DELICATESSEN is a good primer for CITY, because DELI has a more linear plot that won't confuse you. Then you'll be prepped for the real heady stuff.

DELICATESSEN - Original and tasty recipe

[fredberglyle · 7/10 · 19 January 2014]

The originality in the script with finest camera-work and a handful of funny characters does the trick. A dark comedy by Jean-Pierre Jeunet created upon a post-apocalyptic time (at times when food grains are used as currencies). Since the movie is dark natured with lot of weird scenes in surreal situations, the viewer must consider it only as a parody of human-life and not seriously. To mention some : 1) bed-springs sound for a symphony 2) soporific tea scene 4) Cow noise toys and a house full of mad people The plot gets too predictable and even though the story is original it is still hollow/weak.

The bottom line : it is a food/recipe which I'd like to taste again and again (would watch the movie again) but may not be the same for all.

You don't know black comedy until you've seen this movie.

[lee_eisenberg · 8/10 · 8 August 2005]

Jean-Pierre Jeunet has become famous recently for "Amelie" and "A Very Long Engagement". Before he became a cinematic household name in America, he and Marc Caro directed two of the most unusual movies that I've ever seen: "Delicatessen" and "The City of Lost Children" (he also directed "Alien: Resurrection", but that's another story). The former is not all that easy to classify. It has ex-circus clown Louison (Dominique Pinon) moving into an apartment where the butcher is cannibalizing people. While I did like it, I don't want to try to explain it any further, lest I give people the wrong impression of it. Granted, many people will probably want to avoid this movie; there are some pretty unpleasant scenes in it. But anyone who likes to look for artistic, surrealistic, or otherwise avant garde cinema should really admire "Delicatessen". Dominique Pinon, whom Jeunet always casts, is in top-notch form here.

A futuristic comic feast.

[Lady_Targaryen · 6/10 · 29 August 2006]

''Delicatessen '' is not one of the best films ever and certainly it is not my favorite from Caro and Jeunet, but since it came earlier then ''Amélie'' and ''City of the Lost Children'', it needs to have its credits. The plot is also very unique, with a bizarre and dark city where some kind of catastrophe leads people to starve. Food is being used as currency and it is a luxury for a few. A butcher and his neighbors, in order to have meal,have a wicked plan of always lure new tenants, whom they always kill and cannibalize.

By the way, this movie is a dark comedy, so if you are not a fan of the genre, stay distant from renting or buying the DVD.

Overdone

[kenjha · 2/10 · 28 December 2010]

In tough economic times, the landlord of an apartment building, who owns a butcher shop on the first floor, provides meat dishes to his tenants, but what kind of meat is it? The premise has the potential for a delicious black comedy, but the execution here is so bad that it's unwatchable. The humor is more forced than The Three Stooges, and there is not anything here that is even chuckle-worthy. The comedy is so overdone that it's not only unfunny, but it's dreary and depressing. The post-apocalyptic cinematography is somewhat interesting initially but then it accentuates the drab atmosphere and adds to the dreariness of the experience.