This brilliant short long movie (74 minutes) is defined as comedy drama fantasy. In fact it's a sci-fi satire but since fantasy and sci-fi are next of kin I'll accept the term. As for comedy drama - it's a non term to begin with but satire seem to confuse many since it uses humor as its main weapon.
That was all I'll speak about definitions, regarding the movie itself - like all good sci-fi it speaks about the world we live in and more specifically about our gadget worshiping culture. We get here two gadgets one is straightforward gadget - mechanical - Japanese namely coming from the country in which gadgets are the new state religion so it's a gadget with a kosher stamp on it. The other gadget is more of an unexplained device, but as far as I'm concerned it works just like a gadget. It performs a very special trick which the movie accepts as true - unbelievable but true - as the movie title's declares. And its being used by one of the leads in the movie just like any other gadget, so that the way I'll refer to it. As a rule - and that's the reason we get two gadgets in the movie so we can establish a rule and not discuss an episode of a sort - gadgets are born from voids in our lives we need to fill - but voids tend to remain empty no matter how much one tries to fill them. Here lies the problem - trying to fill a void can quickly become an addiction and addictions are dangerous.
So if the fact we all know addictions are dangerous means that this movie is predictable - not really - it means that it establishes its own set of rules and quickly demonstrates to us how these rules correspond with the rules we live by and bring about the same results, for me that's not being predictable but rather brilliant script writing. Combine this with very good acting performances with Lea Drucker topping the list, with very efficient camera work that doesn't need any cinematic fireworks but does deliver. And in my personal book you get a near masterpiece. Go see it - Quentin Dupieux is a director to watch.
That was all I'll speak about definitions, regarding the movie itself - like all good sci-fi it speaks about the world we live in and more specifically about our gadget worshiping culture. We get here two gadgets one is straightforward gadget - mechanical - Japanese namely coming from the country in which gadgets are the new state religion so it's a gadget with a kosher stamp on it. The other gadget is more of an unexplained device, but as far as I'm concerned it works just like a gadget. It performs a very special trick which the movie accepts as true - unbelievable but true - as the movie title's declares. And its being used by one of the leads in the movie just like any other gadget, so that the way I'll refer to it. As a rule - and that's the reason we get two gadgets in the movie so we can establish a rule and not discuss an episode of a sort - gadgets are born from voids in our lives we need to fill - but voids tend to remain empty no matter how much one tries to fill them. Here lies the problem - trying to fill a void can quickly become an addiction and addictions are dangerous.
So if the fact we all know addictions are dangerous means that this movie is predictable - not really - it means that it establishes its own set of rules and quickly demonstrates to us how these rules correspond with the rules we live by and bring about the same results, for me that's not being predictable but rather brilliant script writing. Combine this with very good acting performances with Lea Drucker topping the list, with very efficient camera work that doesn't need any cinematic fireworks but does deliver. And in my personal book you get a near masterpiece. Go see it - Quentin Dupieux is a director to watch.