One Paragraph Movie Review: Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday

Three hundred and fortieth film: Monsieur Hulot’s Holiday, a French slapstick comedy from 1953 that has hardly any plot, hardly any dialogue, and visual gag after visual gag after visual gag. Written, directed, and starring Jacques Tati, it focuses on the misadventures of Monsieur Hulot (clearly an early inspiration for Monsieur Haricot) bumbling his way clumsily through multiple beachside situations. Some gags are as fleeting and brief as the wing-flap of a papillon, while others are laboured, like flogging le cheval mort. It’s madcap! It’s zany! It’s okay I guess! Not really one for playing-for-the-back-row whimsy, I could both understand its charm and keep checking my watch which, in the vein of this movie, was accidentally on the wrist of the arm I plunged into the fishbowl to retrieve my pen instead of on the wrist of the dry arm I didn’t. Sacre bleu, what a pickle! Nup. Two pictures I accidentally made skewiff on the wall with my riding crop out of five.