Treatment for Amélie genre movie.

log line: awkward young man sits on a bench next to a woman with her lunch next to her. we think that he is attracted to her but in the end he goes for the lunch.

treatment: a man is sitting on a bench (we hear his stomach growl) when an attractive woman sits down next to him, on her lunch break. romantic music is cued in.

he eyes her and she notices him. subtly, she shows him cleavage as she opens her lunch. we see his eyes double take as he tries to look away.

she looks up and catches him staring. he looks away. they awkwardly sit next to each other.

as we are looking at him, we hear her moan. his eyes dart towards her and she is sucking the chocolate off her finger as she holds a pudding cup.

his face shows pain/desire. by now we see him writhing on his bench seat. barely able to contain himself.

she stands up and he freezes. we see her walk away behind a tree slowly, hinting at him to follow her. he just stares at her as we see her leave her lunch behind.

he stands up and the screen fades to black.

fade back in. he is on a rooftop somewhere, happily eating the lady’s lunch. romantic music keep splaying on a more cheerful note.

Amelie: Stylistic Devices

The first stylistic device the Director of Amélie uses is color correction. Many of the scenes, and consequently many of the shots, have a distinct yellow feel to them. Either the room starts out as yellow (yellow walls, yellow curtains) or the characters wear yellow. In many scenes there will be that overwhelming presence of yellow. In outdoor shots such as this one, color correction becomes evident as even the yelowness of the sun is exagerated to give the whole film a unified, magical realistic feel. This feel of surrealness is intended to make us understand that although this is the real world, weird, magical tings are stil going to take place.

Furthering the director's intent on creating a surreal world, there is the blend of reality and CG graphics. The personification and physical manifestation of Amélie's imagination serves as our bridge to magical realism. We undestand that anything can happen in this film and that weirder,, yet comedic things will also take place, furthering our interest in the movie, beconing us to continue to watch.


Another way the director destroys our reality is by breaking the 4th wall. Several times throughout the film, characters will break out of the story and adress the audience directly. Here it is the comatose neighbor who wakes up for a second to confirm Amélie's suspicions on why she is asleep. Also, by waking up, we are pulled into Amélie's psyche as she thinks it is possible for the neighbor to just wake up and fall right back asleep. This possiblity of the impossible happening continues to reinforce the idea that this is a magical realism film. Every stylistic element in this scene is meant to enhance the magical feel to the story. The curtains are even yellow in the background, as is the headrest.

One way the director adds humor to the story is by exploiting Amélie's quirks. First, he gives her some oddness about her like collecting stones, or wondering bizarre things (how many people are having an orgasm at that moment). Then he proceeds to show us couples having orgasms. The uncomfortableness of watching characters have orgasms is enough to draw a chuckle or an embarassed and uneasy smile, but then he takes us back to a close up of Amélie as she tells us the exact number of people having an orgasm at that moment. I feel that the director is intentionally trying to break the conventions of film making by introducing "inappropriate" material and resenting it in a comic light. He uses comedy as a form of filmic satire.