TinsHeadline Touches You

Boobirt Stylish but barely mediocre overall

ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.

Helllins It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

FilmCuckoo Gaston Leroux's "The Mystery of the Yellow Room" ("Le mystère de la chambre jaune") is probably the most famous of all locked room mysteries but also one of the earliest examples of this particular type of "who-dunnits". As the novel was originally published in 1908, it is significant enough to note that the novel has been published few decades before the so called "Golden Age" of detective stories. It is equally worth noting that the story is mostly in accordance with rules of the genre codified by Ronald Knox in 1929. Leroux's story only breaks one of those rules, but this is one of those rare occasions where it simply doesn't matter. The importance of the story is also evident, when we know it has been selected as the best "locked room mystery" by detective story readers on numerous occasions, only alternating places with John Dickson Carr's locked room mystery masterpiece "The Hollow Man" (which amazingly has never been made into film). "The Mystery of the Yellow Room" was interestingly the absolute favourite of John Dickson Carr, who undeniably is the master of the locked room mysteries, and Carr often said that Leroux's novel influenced him the most, always making him to push solutions of the locked room mystery to the limits because of the sheer simple brilliance of the solution in Leroux's novel, even it is far from being "simple".This 2003 film version is the 6th time the classic mystery novel has been made into film, and by far the best on this reviewers opinion, as long as what it comes to how faithfully Leroux's plot is being followed. The story pace is somewhat slow from the start, and doesn't seem to gather up just enough steam until we get to the end climax, and the long awaited solution - where the pace actually turns into rapid cuts and flashbacks alternating with the past and presence due to the requirements to portray the solution in such way that it maintains the needed undivided attention of the viewer. It's also worth mentioning that a viewer who doesn't know the solution, is during the movie given all the important clues and hints needed to solve the crime by themselves, or at least enables one to have suspicions in the right direction if you are an experienced viewer (or reader) of the genre, however even then, most viewers will still be stunned out of their socks upon learning the solution.There are number of very perceptive scenes in this movie, setting a lighthearted atmosphere, almost like director doesn't want the viewer taking the story too seriously from the very start. An example of this is the opening title scene, with a toy train going on one incredibly long track for the duration of the opening, only to reach the end of the tracks as the actual movie begins to reveal another hilarious scene with a group of gentlemen passengers reading their newspapers on a train in a synchronised manner as they would in fact being intensely following the narrators voice. Because of these small, yet amusing tidbits, the film does have much lighter feel than Leroux's novel which is in fact quite dark, and reads almost like a horror story.Director Bruno Podalydès as screenwriter has thankfully chosen to follow the original plot to the letter, which holds this movie together just as it is, somehow distant and elusive at points, but still constantly moving on (like a train indeed), however with slightly inconsistent cinematographic style, which ranges from really good to hastily ill- conceived. The Director's brother Denis Podalydès plays the lead role as the journalist Joseph Rouletabille in highly commendable way, also doubles in the story as the primary amateur sleuth. His appearance as Rouletabille is curiously close enough to Leroux's description of him being "A small, thin man, endowed with unusually large head". Denis Podalydès manages to pull off his lead role with flying colours, including a charming slight lisp in his french accent. The character of Sainclair (routinely played by Jean-Noël Brouté), slightly dimwitted photographer sidekick of Rouletabille, has remarkable tendency not having any kind of presence in any of the scenes, even he is almost constantly behind, or at the side of Rouletabille. Most of the cast is compiled from some of the best actors that France has to offer, including legendary Michael Lonsdale as the old man Stangerson. But there's not much more really to say about the remaining cast, unless mentioning in the same breath the word "routinely what you would expect". This movie is well worth watching, not only because of the jaw dropping solution (Interesting even if you don't like "who-dunnits"), but because the movie is just balanced enough, regardless of some minor issues with some of the actors and the earlier mentioned slow pace, which does feel somewhat boring at times, but all together very enjoyable watch and in it's own category a definite must see you just cannot afford to miss.

writers_reign This is one for Sylists. The Podalydes brother put on, to quote the pop song, the style. In spades. Essentially they - Bruno as writer/director possibly a tad more than Denis as actor - have taken Gaston Leroux' celebrated 'locked-door' mystery, which was responsible seemingly for Agatha Christie's career, given it a lick of paint, thrown in some loving 'period' detail and added some of the finest actors in French cinema to the mix. There are those who will be disappointed that the 'mysterious' element fails to rivet attention; equally there will be others who relish the stylistic touches, the brilliantly whimsical opening credits featuring one of those carefully 'weighted' devices which delivers a ball to successively lower levels until it is deposited onto a train which then runs on its own miniature rails through open countryside and segues into a real train carrying four of the principals to the scene of the 'mystery'. Eccentricism is the order of the day which means that English viewers will have no problem relating to half the principals (ironically it has yet to be shown in England) and Podalydes is scrupulous in his attention to period detail, costumes, etc. Even setting the mystery itself to one side there is much to savor in the playing of such luminaries as Fanny Ardant, Sabine Azema, Michael Lonsdale, Denis Podalydes, Isabelle Candalier and Pierre Arditi. In total a very pleasant romp.

tedg What to do when you encounter something like this? Its so remarkably perfect in one dimension and so busted in another, so horribly mangled.What's screwed is the actual mystery, how it is spun and "explained." There's a reason why the standard form concentrates the solution in a blast at the end, perhaps with some visual recall and recreation of what we have seen and puzzled over.Here, fully a third of the movie is "explanation," and oh lord is it tedious. Early in the explanation we simply stop caring. After this ended, I couldn't help recalling the recent "The Illusionist," which handled a puzzle of a similar type with immensely more grace and engagement. So that kills it. There's a last minute revelation, but by that time we have already left the story.But on the good side, there is such fun in how this is cinematically elaborated. The world that is created is so gently comic, so mechanically articulated that I will recommend this anyway. There are completely surreal qualities: the detective we follow apparently leaves France and goes to America to do research and returns, all within an evening. Some of the decisions of the filmmakers build on the hooks in the book: the accompanying photographer, the dueling detectives, the father of the attacked as an inventor of machines whose elaborate and indirect mechanisms mirror the way the filmmakers see the plot.The famed title sequence is of such a machine: a ball rolls through troughs and drops and different devices, eventually falling into a toy train that segues into a real train with our four observers on their way to the crime scene.Then once at the crime scene we meet the father who invents and builds just these sorts of machines. In the train, we are given a clue in how the newspapers are read in perfect sync by the four readers that some symmetry principals will be at work: if we see a father who makes elaborate machines maybe we should be looking for the same or similar elsewhere. But the signal isn't strong enough; even I missed it and I am obsessed with such cues.So its really odd that the thing is so perfectly structured, with such symmetries that you should be able to just look at the missing reflections to parse out the answer. And at the same time it is so asymmetrical in its excellence: the form of the story so deft in one way and so incompetent in another. Its like visiting a Guarini-designed baroque church. Some elements are garish and repulsive while others are transcendently lifealtering.Other things to recommend this. The French, let's face it, are generally ugly. The faces chosen for this production leverage that and give us faces that don't try to be engaging by prettiness. That frees the actors to give us characters that are deeper than usual, creating types that have reality.Also. The woman who is the target for the murder attempts and who is supposed to be about 40 I guess, is played by an oddly appealing redhead. She's the long time companion of Alain Resnais, one of the French new wavers actually worth spending time with. She's almost a prop, as is the only other woman in the cast. The plot depends on the affections of these women being mechanically predicable.Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.

NaoNoisen Interesting comical actor direction... But nothing even close to the wit that we can read in the book. Another one of those sad cases where the book, much longer than a 2-hour adaptation would allow, is twice more interesting than the movie. And it's always sad, for someone who read the book before, to notice that they didn't hesitate to remove most of the secondary plot lines, and even change the configuration of the infamous "Yellow Room" (which was very important to the plot).But my worst worry would be for some of the actors they hired. Father Jacques is played by a man with an accent (what a stupid idea!) and a very bad actor. But even worse is Robert Darzac -- described as elegant and charming in the book, he also wears a mustache... Which he doesn't in the movie. Of course, the movie also forgets to render him as even remotely elegant or charming. And did I mention he's a very bad actor too? Well, maybe he just did what he was asked to do... Then it's probably the director's fault.Do yourself a favor and read the book. It's excellent (and basically the book that inspired Agatha Christie in her youth), and doesn't need any of these fancy "inventions" that plague the movie.