Irma Vep (1996) User Reviews (67)

I know I'm supposed to love it, but I did like it.

[runamokprods · 7/10 · 15 June 2011]

I feel downright churlish for not going completely crazy for this funny/sad look at movie- making -- specifically the rather absurd, doomed remaking of a real French classic, by an aging, out of style art-house director, starring Hong Kong action heroine Maggie Chung, who plays herself delightfully.

I enjoyed the film; its sort of a complex 1990s 'Day for Night', with a paradoxical and sometimes confusing point of view about the nature of art and the state of film.

But I couldn't see it for the masterpiece a number of intelligent critics gave it credit for being. Jonathan Rosenbaum, the terrific critic from the Chicago Reader wrote a very long, in depth analysis that went right over my head, and then added insult to injury by implying that people who don't see the film as a deep investigation of the evils of capitalism, and the meaning of ART are somehow shallow.

I'm also surprised by the number of people who take the ramblings of an obnoxious reporter character in the film about the death of French art cinema as being the film's point of view on these issues. To me the film isn't taking sides, and seems to be gently satirizing, and yet embracing all of film.

Good natured, well acted, and occasionally brave (but also occasionally obscure) I quite enjoyed this and it did provoke some thinking. But I couldn't see it as the super deep film some did. For me, it was fun, but the ideas are far less deep or radical then critics seem to want to give them credit for being.

A well-constructed, pleasant surprise.

[kergillian · 8/10 · 22 May 2001]

Maggie Cheung or not, I didn't expect much out of this film. But I was quite pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it. For one, to get someone to play themselves in a lead role in a fictional film (Jackie Chan films and Roy Rogers aside;) is usually a risky thing to do. But Cheung fits in beautifully, and is so charming that she is obviously perfectly cast.

The film is in English and French, and even though the French is subtitled, I think it's easier to get caught up in the flow of the film if you understand both (I'm fluent in French and didn't have a problem, but I can see where it might be overly distracting). Some scenes seemed particularly important for one to be constantly looking away from the action, so to speak.

The film was a little long, and some scenes probably could have been cut down or cut altogether, but it gives a good view into French film-making, especially the snobbish elitism that is apparently common in more intellectual/artistic film circles. It's hysterically funny at some points, and the characterization of the different crew members is brilliantly portrayed.

I especially loved the scene where Maggie Cheung gets into characters by actually prowling around as a cat burglar (though she throws away her booty;)

Overall: a tight, well done film. It drags just a bit at points, but strong acting and strong writing help to overcome such lags. A pleasant surprise and a fun film! 8/10.

If They Finish A Movie, It's A Miracle

[boblipton · 6/10 · 7 October 2019]

French director Jean-Pierre Léaud decides to remake Feuillade's silent serial LES VAMPIRES as a modern feature. He decides to cast Maggie Cheung as Irma Vep based on seeing her in one movie in Marrakesh. When the movie opens, Miss Cheung has just arrived at Léaud's office in the last throes of pre-production, whence she is whisked away to a sex shop to buy a gimp suit to be modified for her costume. After that, things become chaotic, with spoiled takes, spoiled tempers and journalists who lecture her on how to make films.

Miss Cheung is wonderful in the role, a sweet-faced, slightly puzzled woman stranded alone in Paris, trying to perform her part in her first international production, while chaos swirls about her.

There is a lovely, impromptu feel about Olivier Assayas' movie. It feels as if he started out trying to do the remake, and as that became impossible, switched to a different film. That seems unlikely. Undoubtedly that was the look and feel he was trying for. The result is an amusing, slightly tentative effort that makes me wish to look at LES VAMPIRES again.

Maggie Cheung and the embers of the French Avant-Garde

[jdm101 · 8 October 2004]

Irma Vep is a film about film-making, an insightful and disturbing film which delivers some beautiful voyeuristic glimpses of vampirism, realist cinema, gritty black-and-white cine-retro and the old men who were once the chic of the French avant-garde film clique.

IMDb says: "Rene Vidal, a director in decline, decides to remake Louis Feuillade's silent serial Les Vampires" but this summary does not mention the real star of the film - Hong Kong kung-fu actress Maggie Cheung, playing herself. She is perfect as the exotic object, the ephemeral other, the object of desire who finds herself at the centre of the film's obsessive and sexually driven visual vortex.

In the privacy of her hotel room, Maggie Cheung zips herself into a full-body black latex catsuit which is going to be her vampire costume on the film set the next day. Maybe she is just getting into character, or maybe she shares something of the director's fascination with nocturnal life... predatory sexuality... visual fixation... the bound female form... anyway, the film really comes to life as she creeps through the hotel, her haunting feline eyes piercing through the spooky-sexy costume... the suspense here is that she is enacting her own vampire fantasy, of her own accord, not under the director's gaze. Maggie Cheung, all alone, on the roof, in the rain, exploring her own version of a male fantasy sequence. This is an unforgettable moment in art-house cinema.

The film really does justice to its themes, with the male characters degenerating from visionaries into voyeurs, and the female characters showing real depth in their willingness to accommodate the male gaze without losing their savvy post-fem powers. If you are a predictable guy like me, you will love the French-Asian grrrl power, which gives the film a pulse.

The theme of visual obsession is presented very well: the director is shouting, the cameras are rolling, and Maggie Cheung, in her catsuit, is ready to suck blood. In these moments she is bound but free, powerless but in control, objectified but liberated. I suppose this makes the film contentious and provocative, but I thought the message was very clear.

Without spoiling the end of the film: the last five minutes of Irma Vep is totally unique. You will never see another film which ends like this one. I can only describe it as a profoundly futile gesture, an act of great passion and impotence, and a brilliant moment in Lettrist art. It is Rene Vidal's last stand, a terrible but beautiful moment caught on celluloid: the work of a madman? a savant? a genius? you can decide, but I am sure you will agree that Irma Vep does a lot more than just scratch the surface of modern film art.

If you like Irma Vep, check out Shadow Of The Vampire as well.

The film probably means more to the French

[Anyanwu · 6/10 · 26 March 2000]

This movie probably means more to the French and French film with its inside French film references. Seemed like it had a cool idea going but it didn't really seem to get going. Characters were not really developed enough. The relationship between the costume maker and Irma Vep character did not get off the ground. When things got interesting the movie was over. I would recommend it but only so as to view French film talking about itself.

Sexy, funny, smart, sad, EXCELLENT.

[Will-84 · 10/10 · 22 May 1999]

Unlike Scoopy, I say this movie is WELL worth the effort and time, especially if you're familiar with the French New Wave. Jean-Pierre Leaud, one of the biggest stars of the period (he was the little boy in Francois Truffaut's seminal "The 400 Blows" [no pun intended]) is hilarious as a caricature of Godard in particular and French filmmakers in general, and the rooftop interview with (the stunning) Maggie Cheung refers to both Godard's "Breathless" and, indirectly, Fellini's "8 1/2." Though it pokes good fun at the pretentiousness of the French New Wave, "Irma Vep" is also a tender elegy to a time in which movies were actually viewed as art, as something that really MATTERED. Add to the humor and intelligence some really witty direction, superstylish cinematography, and a slew of beautiful people, and you got yerself a postmodern masterpiece and just maybe one last, great film of the New Wave.

Maggie Cheung is marvellous but .....

[gray4 · 6/10 · 29 August 2008]

I got hold of this DVD because of its reputation as an unknown, recent, experimental French art film. It was certainly experimental although to avoid spoilers I shall not indicate how (or when). But the overall impact was rather disappointing. Maggie Cheung, playing herself, was just fantastic - serene and professional but increasingly absorbed in the odd role of "Irma Vep" (yes, it's an anagram). So much so that the role, or at least the black latex catsuit, takes over away from the set, and her scene as Irma in her hotel is one of the film's two highlights.

The basic premise - ageing film-maker (good performance by Jen-Pierre Leaud) making his tribute to the innocent days of early French silent cinema - is fascinating, and used as a vehicle for questioning where French cinema is going in the 1990s. This is brought out particularly well when Maggie is interviewed by a cynical French journalist. But somehow the sub-plots,revolving around the tensions between crew members, don't match or illuminate the central theme. So a film well worth seeing for the star performance by Maggie Cheung but ultimately an experiment that didn't quite come off - but you must stay with it till then end.

...In which Olivier Assayas tries out a bunch of different ideas with no cohesion

[bastard_wisher · 8/10 · 23 June 2006]

This is a very solid film, make no mistake, but it tends to play more like a testing ground for various elements of Olivier Assayas' overall style, particularly those which he would later explore more fully in his later masterpiece "Demonlover", than any sort of cohesive narrative statement. It's not very often that a film strikes me as not having enough of a plot, but in the case of this there did seem to be a certain irrelevance to it all. There's nothing really new about the "making a movie" movie, and this doesn't add much to the mix, although i do think it is well done for what it is, and occasionally even approaches a sort of proto-"Lost in Translation", with Paris standing in for Tokyo and Maggie Cheung's Asian "otherness" replacing Bill Murray's fish-out-of-water Americanness. But the film is never really focused enough to compare in any significant way to that film. "Irma Vep" really only comes alive when Assayas gets away from his nagging tendency towards a certain French talkiness and indulges in the moments of pure visual cinema that make up the other half of his general approach (and which seem to be invested with much more enthusiasm here) , such as the scene scored to Sonic Youth's "Tunic" (another foreshadowing of "Demonlover"). Certainly he does have a way with capturing pretty little images of neon lights reflecting through car windows and things like that, enough that I can acknowledge he is definitely a talented filmmaker, but within this film he never quite finds the correct way to integrate his little artistic flourishes into the whole, and overall the film feels more like a collection of separate ideas than a cohesive statement of any kind.

Surprisingly entertaining

[sansay · 7/10 · 22 February 2008]

I just watched Irma Vep last night. And I have to say that I enjoyed watching this movie for many reasons. Evidently Maggie is one of the reasons. Beautiful of course and good actress to boot. But beyond that, we have a lot of other things that kept my interest alive all along. This movie presents a self examination of French movie making, thereby justifying the accusation of "nombrilisme" (narcissism) by the reporter interviewing Maggy. This seems to be one of the themes here. A close look at the movie making process in France where a certain lack of coordination seems to be the rule, where a director launches the movie making only based on a whim. And in this case, it's the idea of having Maggie Cheung play the main role of a character in a remake of a 1915 silent movie. What really becomes interesting is the way she gets into the role and really becomes Irma. But I will leave you to discover how and when. At any rate, the movie has the funny effect to make you wonder if French movie making is in that bad a state that it can come up with such an interesting product.

Fast

[ziggy-24 · 9/10 · 4 October 2000]

This is a fast movie! Shot in 3 weeks with a budget not fit for an ad, Irma Vep has its roots in a silent masterpiece and explodes right in the 21st century. The plot is only a pretext to explore what cinema has become today. It is an excellent ride in the History of this art-form. I loved it. It is subtle and fast.

Not bad, but I expected more

[MarcoParzivalRocha · 6/10 · 11 March 2021]

A well-known Chinese actress travels to Paris for the remake of "Les Vampires", and during the production stage she finds herself in the middle of a battle of egos and complex personalities.

Maggie Cheung (Clean, In the Mood for Love, Hero) plays herself, in a visually rich film, but poor in content and substance.

The premise and atmosphere are interesting, as expected from a film inserted in the experimental and stylish genre.

The film intends to be a critic of the French cinematographic world (in the mid 90's), seen as elitist and for intellectuals, however, it cannot define itself, and loses cohesion between the satirist and the message to be transmitted for the audience.

Some scenes are unnecessarily long, and the narrative does not have a concrete focus, wandering through subplots that are not needed.

The major highlight is the role of Maggie Cheung, dazzling and hypnotic from start to finish.

A brilliant addition to movies about movies

[MOscarbradley · 8/10 · 4 January 2018]

As much a homage to Truffaut's "Day for Night" as it is to Feuillade's "Les Vampires", the movie within the movie that is being remade with Maggie Cheung playing herself as "Irma Vep" and, of course, no homage to Truffaut would be complete without Jean-Pierre Leaud, here cast as the director. It's great fun and a worthy addition to films about films though it makes me glad, for any fame or fortune it might have afforded me, I never ended up working in the industry which comes across here as an asylum that the inmates have taken over. Playing herself, Cheung is wonderfully self-effacing and director Olivier Assayas draws beautifully naturalistic performances from his entire cast. Never likely to achieve the international success of Truffaut's classic "Irma Vep" makes for a first-class cult movie.

Watching the original before tackling the new series

[axb · 6/10 · 8 June 2022]

What is Irma Vep about? The obsession of a failing director for a classic silent film serial translates into an electricity filled (I mean this literally) short reel of a remake. Along the way we meet several frenzied and frazzled characters doing pretty much- nothing. They rehearse a scene or two, but mostly talk, talk and talk. Very French with shades of Robert Altman. Many characters, many obsessions and a subtle exploration of hidden selves. In particular, Maggie Cheung walks onto the film set knowing virtually nothing about it and learns something about her own predilections through a mere costume change. However, the rest of the film is a bit muddled and somewhat conventional. References to French New Wave and other cinematic touchstones abound within a chaotic story structure. In the end, the film is slightly amusing, but leaves you mostly Breathless. There- I achieved the level of cinephilia demonstrated by the director Olivier Assayas in this film. I will skip the new HBO series, although I love Alicia Vikander.

This was unique...

[paul_haakonsen · 5/10 · 4 July 2021]

Today in 2021 is my second time to watch the 1996 movie "Irma Vep". I saw it back in the day shortly after it was released, but haven't seen it since. Then as the chance presented itself to revisit the 1996 movie "Irma Vep" from writer and director Olivier Assayas, of course I did so.

Needless to say that the main reason for why I watched this movie is because of Maggie Cheung. I have been a huge fan of her for about 32 years, give or take. And of course she is the driving force behind a movie such as "Irma Vep".

There is a sense of self indulgence to this movie, something about the French cinema being bloated and overly full of itself. Not that I would know much about that, because I am not overly familiar with French cinema. But "Irma Vep" does paint the French people in sort of a cliché light here, as they seem to be drinking and smoking a lot.

The storyline in "Irma Vep" is a little bit odd, to tell the truth, and there is that artistic touch to it that French cinema is known for, for better or worse. Now, a movie like "Irma Vep" is not a movie that will be overly enjoyable to everyone in the audience, as much of the contents of the storyline is something of an acquired taste.

As I mentioned before, Maggie Cheung is the driving force of this movie, as she almost single-handedly carries the entire movie with her performance. And of course it is great fun to watch her in that costume; something you don't get to see her do in the Hong Kong cinema.

Ultimately, then "Irma Vep" is a watchable movie, if you can tolerate oddball French cinema. However, this is not a movie that has much of any broader appeal, as this is definitely a niche experience.

I am rating "Irma Vep" a five out of ten stars, based mostly on the performance of Maggie Cheung.

More style than substance

[harry_tk_yung · 26 September 2005]

An odd little piece of cinematic work by Olivier Assayas on a brief episode (fictional) about a Hong Kong actress brought to France by an eccentric director to play the title role in his revival of a silent movie, Irma Vep makes reference to, among other things, Michelle Pfeiffer's Catwoman in "Batman Returns" (1992), in the context of the body tight latex outfit designed for the heroine.

As a movie about making movies, Irma Vep has considerably less to offer than Truffaut's "Day for Night" (1973). However, Maggie Cheung, 8 years before winning best actress in Cannes with "Clean" (2004) and playing herself in this stylish satire, was well received by critics, one of whom described one of her scenes thus: "When Maggie hears that Zoé is attracted to her, she's both charmed and incredulous: a swath of emotions, from confusion to cautious delight, passes across her face with the subtlety and playfulness of ripples on a lake."

With only a hint of a plot, Irma Vep looks more like a series or sketches, or even a documentary, sustained by nervous energy. While the satire on the current (1996) state of movie-making in France would mean considerably more to people familiar with the scene, the movie on the while is more style than substance to the general audience.

Navigating the Labyrinth of Storytelling: A Complex Journey Through Reality and Fiction

[pchs0114 · 7/10 · 15 September 2023]

The film serves as a fascinating commentary on the complexities and paradoxes inherent in filmmaking. Taking the audience behind the scenes, it navigates a labyrinthine plot that operates on multiple strata, blurring the lines between reality and fiction. At its heart, the film questions the essence of storytelling and the role of the audience. Its meta-narrative and dream-like ambience can both captivate and disorient viewers. While it shies away from offering concrete resolutions or a neatly wrapped conclusion, its open-ended nature invites interpretation and contemplation. For those who appreciate films that defy easy categorisation and stimulate thought, this is a compelling watch. However, its unconventional storytelling approach and absence of closure may not resonate with everyone. Overall, it provides a complex, multi-layered cinematic experience that remains both elusive and thought-provoking.

Excellent -- Now Make the Real Movie!

[gavin6942 · 8/10 · 19 May 2016]

A Chinese movie actress (Maggie Cheung as herself), in France to star in a remake of "Les Vampires", finds petty intrigues and clashing egos on the set.

The idea for the film was born out of an attempted collaboration between Assayas, Claire Denis, and Atom Egoyan, who wanted to experiment with the situation of a foreigner in Paris. In the 1915 original serial, written and directed by Louis Feuillade, Irma Vep was played by French silent film actress Musidora (1889–1957). Much of the film depicts set-related incidents that echo scenes in Truffaut's "La nuit americaine", to which Irma Vep owes a large thematic debt. However, Assayas has publicly stated that although he considers "La nuit americaine" a great film, it is more about the fantasy of filmmaking than the reality. Assayas credits Rainer Werner Fassbinder's "Beware of a Holy Whore" as a much greater inspiration.

I love that Atom Egoyan was involved in some way. I must have missed him on the crew list, unless he dropped out before the final version got started. This film works on many levels, because it features a remake of "The Vampires", which strikes me as a brilliant idea. It then takes that and makes it a film about making such a film, and generally speaking I think those sort of films work well. Then it goes to the third level and has Maggie Cheung play herself (sort of), almost making it sort of a pseudo-documentary...

1996 Film Predecessor of 2022 Series

[buy-99943 · 6/10 · 29 July 2023]

Fundamentally the title "1996 Film Predecessor of 2022 Series" becomes sensical if the viewer has after the fact of release actually watched the 2022 HBO Series.

Obviously this review should focus on the 1996 Film, but sticking with the meta theme it seems acceptable to declare it a mashup of disjointed cinema franchise thoughts that were somewhat understandable and enjoyable, as a stand alone film.

This film having a main character Irma Vep demonstrating limited spiritual-like qualities as the namesake of the film, really in hindsight hands off an unbaked concept to the later series' main character Irma Vep 26 years later, allowing the 2022 character and ensemble to deliver a robust and entertaining show, with the limited main-character similarity of only brown eyes.

The 2022 show depicts where the concept and ideas of the 1996 show were intended to be brought into fruition, but constrained by a limited budget.

This 1996 show brings to light the mystically enchanted fantasy of story telling with a French cinema flavor, based upon the roaring 20's beginning of the Vampires genre. The principals of a show's ensemble, talent and crew, their roles and responsibilities are flushed out and presented to the audience, providing real life trials and tribulations shrouded in an underlying mystery.

Assayas' love letter to Maggie Cheung sounds out an epidemic Gallic neurosis through a pair of foreign eyes along with its spellbinding mise-en-abyme conceit

[lasttimeisaw · 8/10 · 4 September 2018]

Presumably no one should grudge a film director for making a movie as a love letter to woo his future wife, it is totally his de jure entitlement. IRMA VEP (the name is an anagram of VAMPIRE) is overtly Olivier Assayas' token of love for HK actress Maggie Cheung, who would marry him in 1998, only their reunion would soon dissolve 3 years later, capped by a unusual valedictory project CLEAN (2004), which turns out to be quite a curate's egg for her fans, it copped her a BEST ACTRESS title in Cannes, but also heralds her unmitigated hibernation from the screen to date.

A French old-school filmmaker René Vidal (Léaud, sporting an inarticulate English in sullenness and fatigue), is making his latest work, a remake of Louis Feuillade's silent crime serial LES VAMPIRES (1915-1916, 10 episodes in toto) and fingers a Hong Kong actress (Maggie archly plays herself with high spirit) for the leading role Irma Vep, a feline Parisian burglar outfit with a superfine latex catsuit (her racial changeover would become an issue in the later stage).

Maggie arrives alone in Paris to shoot her part, and soon becomes convivially discombobulated à la LOST IN TRANSLATION (2003) amid the rumbustious filming proceedings, in particular, cannot grasp what René truly wants in her. She is befriended by Zoé (Richard, who is prickly and gabby to a great extent of spontaneity), the costume designer, who at first brings her to a sex shop to try the outfit, and later a friend gathering where she confides her attraction of Maggie to Mireille (Ogier), only to her chagrin that the latter cannot keep a secret, which casts an ambiguous tension between their fresh, tentative bond, eventually, there is a bar between occidental gregariousness and oriental propriety, Assayas knows best.

Through Assayas' intimate eye and DP Eric Gautier's serpentine camera choreography, a satirical understatement of that unique Gallic neurosis tempered with a weird mixture of angst and entropy, pervades the scenery and heavily hinges on tempestuous verbal exchanges, whether it is in the working place or private occasions. This faux-documentary style becomes all the more mesmerizing when Assayas offers inclusive dissection of the toxic, fickle industry itself under its spectacular mise-en-abyme front.

Whereas the production slowly veers into a downward spiral, buffeted by disastrous rushes-screening, harsh criticism from journalists, a nervous breakdown and compounding rift among staff, Maggie's own search for her character takes a bewitchingly oneiric turn inside the hotel she stays, a trance-like escapade coupled with the cacophony of Sonic Youth and a fluorescent raining night, actuates a surreal kick that is decadently delectable.

Bookended by the black-and-white montage of Maggie's Irma Vep in its raw, solarized and post-edited randomness, Assayas' conceit hits the home run, he wins the girl and we are also proper swooned.

Movies about movies

[lastliberal-853-253708 · 7/10 · 10 March 2012]

Those who love Hong Kong films know Maggie Chueng. She has been in 89 films like Police Story, 2046, Hero, and Ashes of Time. This is her international debut.

Jean-Pierre Leaud (The 400 Blows) plays a quirky director that chose Chueng to play Irma Vep in a remake of the 10 episode Les Vampires. She doesn't speak French, so this makes for both comedy and resentment.

Chueng is luminously erotic in this film about film making, encased in a shiny black latex like Catwoman. Cheung goes along with the lunacy around her, and even participates at one point.

Bizarre and beautiful, this take on independent film making shines with Chueng.

the mid-age crisis of the French New Wave

[dromasca · 9/10 · 29 May 2020]

Movies about movie making are a cinematic genre that has produced many remarkable creations over time. Filmmakers like to make films about their profession. Many of them are tributes to the great creators of the past, rarer are films that critically address the film-making profession and bring into debate crisis situations or social and professional issues related to the film industry. 'Irma Vep' made in 1996 by Olivier Assayas belongs rather to the second category. This film critically addresses the situation of the French film industry at the end of the last century, the connection with the French New Wave tradition, and its place in a world where commercial cinema and violent international productions were already becoming dominant. 'Irma Vep' was made 35 years after the revolutionary impact of the New French Wave. Another 24 years have passed since then. From the perspective of watching or re-watching it in 2020, the film seems just as fresh and clear in its messages, which are confirmed by the perspective of the time that has passed since its making.

The year is 1996 and the generation of the New Wave was going through the mid-age crisis. Many of its famous directors were beyond the peak of their creativity, their innovations had long since ceased to be surprises, and viewers had left their films attracted by Hollywood productions or violent international co-productions. This is also the case of Rene Vidal (played by Jean-Pierre Léaud) who, perhaps in the absence of original scripts, accepts the proposal to direct a remake of Louis Feuillade's vampire films ('Irma Vep' is an anagram of the word 'vampire ') and cast in the lead role (a kind of parody of Catwoman) Maggie Cheung he had seen in a martial arts film (actually he had rather seen the stunt that doubled her). The film follows a few days of filming in which the Hong Kong actress faces the culture and mentality shock created by the differences between what she knows about French cinema and reality, and the chaotic way the local team works.

'Irma Vep' is a film about how movies are made and about people who make movies. Maggie Cheung plays her own self, as an actress who uses the method of entering the role, even wearing at night at her hotel the latex costume of her character from the movie and emulating the thefts of the heroine of the adventure movies. In her interactions with the French colleagues many details are lost in translation, but the incipient lesbian idyll with the props girl Zoe (played by Nathalie Richard) gives both actresses the occasion of making sensitive creations and scenes of confusing delicacy. Olivier Assayas matches the cinematography style to the film director in the film, until his hero abandons filming (personal crisis?, drugs? both likely), and then the shoulder-held mobile camera is replaced by fixed frames that his replacement, a more conservative director (played by Lou Castel) prefers. There are a few more memorable scenes including an ending that I will just describe as great and that I recommend you watching along with the whole movie. 'Irma Vep' is a love story and a critical vision of French cinema. We criticize what we love, because we care.

French satire on the making of a film

[rosscinema · 7/10 · 16 June 2005]

We do see satires on the making of films from time to time but we really don't see many of them come from France and say what you will about the current state of movie making this film makes some extremely poignant references to the differences between film-making in America and Europe. Story is about an aging film director named Rene Vidal (Jean-Pierre Leaud) who has seen better days in terms of his career but he's just started the improbable task of remaking the 1915 Louis Feuillade classic "Les Vampires" starring Hong Kong actress Maggie Cheung (playing herself) and things (naturally) just don't seem to be working.

*****SPOILER ALERT***** Cheung doesn't necessarily know what Vidal expects of her in terms of a performance but they do fit her in a black latex costume which she enjoys. Since she doesn't know how to speak French and has no one to really talk to Cheung gets to know the wardrobe lady Zoe (Nathalie Richard) but things get a bit uncomfortable when Zoe (who's a lesbian) becomes attracted to her. One night Cheung puts her sleek black costume on and in an attempt to get into character prowls around the hotel she's staying at and even sneaks into the room of a naked woman and steals some of her jewelry. Meanwhile, Vidal has resigned from being director and another veteran filmmaker comes in to try and salvage the movie but he doesn't like the choices in casting and wants Cheung out of the film.

This is directed by Olivier Assayas who is extremely talented and has alway's shown a keen eye for sharp dialog and here he succeeds in satirizing the movie making process with a French flair. Some of the best moments in the film come when characters talk about the differences between countries in the way of what audiences are entertained by in film. The highlight of the film (for me and I think for most viewers) comes when Cheung wears that Michelle Pfeiffer catwoman-like latex outfit and the scene wear she stalks around the hotel hallway and sneaks into a room to steal jewelry is captivating but it should be because Cheung is captivating herself. My only complaint about the film comes with the way that Cheung all but disappears at the end without as much as a reference to her fate. I guess she was just replaced in the lead role and headed back to Hong Kong but it would have been nice to see how she would have handled the whole situation. Instead, the last scene of her is being driven away in a cab after chickening out on going to a club with her lesbian admirer Zoe. In case you like trivia than you might like to know that Cheung and Assayas ended up getting married but were divorced in 2001 but have continued to work together.

Possibly the best French art film ever!

[Eegah Guy · 10/10 · 9 November 2001]

This film ignores most of the things that make French art films such a chore to sit through and keeps a kinetic energy that continues from beginning to end through the use of handheld camerawork, overlapping dialogue, excellent music selections (Sonic Youth!) and an ending that lapses into total experimental film techniques. The (ad-libbed?) scripting and acting are totally believable in relating the chaos and turmoil involved in putting together a feature film as well as flawlessly imitating the look and feel of the "you-are-there" documentary. Especially interesting for Honk Kong film freaks is the presence of Maggie Cheung acting as herself and remarking on working with Jackie Chan but not John Woo (too masculine!), while her interviewer remarks that French cinema is boring and made only for intellectuals. This is a great film about cinema and particularly how French cinema has become stale and out-of-touch with its own audience.

Maggie Cheung is so beautiful!

[g-89622 · 7/10 · 12 October 2021]

French literary film, Maggie Cheung was fancy by the French director because of the Three Kingdoms of the East, and went to France to appear as a female vampire, but because of the failure of the director, it was finally lost. Maggie Cheung in 1996 was really beautiful, and she was very handsome between her eyebrows. Interspersed with black and white images, the director edited a Maggie Cheung-style vampire at the end. It is very experimental. There are large close-ups of Maggie Cheung everywhere, full of the director's fascination with the heroine.

Out of Focus

[Cineanalyst · 5/10 · 29 July 2005]

Modern French cinema is far removed from the time when Louis Feuillade made his silent serial "Les Vampires". In 1915, the war had stifled the French film industry, as elsewhere, and thus the international dominance of Hollywood since. "Irma Vep", a film about filmmaking with all the self-reflexive jesting, owes more to the New Wave of several decades later.

In it, a director plans to remake the nearly seven-hour long silent serial "Les Vampires", and he plans to remake it as a silent film, to boot. Casting a Hong Kong action star in the lead was the most rational decision he made. Here in lies the absurd humor of "Irma Vep". It's a clever idea, although a recycled one. I especially like the use of a silent serial, as I've seen many silent films (although I don't care for "Les Vampires" or serials in general). Anyhow, there are some good pokes at the modern French film industry; quibbles over the uncomfortable coexistence between commercial, popular movies (which would include "Les Vampires") and the artsy, government-funded ones (which would probably include "Irma Vep"); and French filmmaker stereotypes are exploited.

The comicality is hit or miss, but that's not what I consider the film's major problem. I think the subplots (the lesbianism, personal affairs and such) detract from it. "Irma Vep" lacks focus, just as with the film within the film. The various story-lines and the film's style stray far from the path, but the problem is there doesn't seem to have been much of a path to begin with and, in the end, we get images from a completely unfocused mind.