Chronopolis

This movie rules, easily one of the better movies I've ever seen. I don't even speak french but it doesn't really matter because there aren't many words in it. This is nice because the Luc Ferrari soundtrack is amazing.

The film is all animation and maybe claymation/stop motion effects galore. Way tripped out. It's kinda academic but not in a dull or boring way. I believe there is a plot to the film, but usually I'm so amazed by the visual images that I hardly pay attention enough to figure it out. Basically, it's got a sort of early 80's industrial feel with lots of imaginative effects and scenery, bouncing balls morphing around crazy backgrounds, turning into small people, entertaining bigger people with weird headgear...Incredible, but pretty hard to find. It's worth the look if your into this kinda stuff.

This is not a movie that you watch for entertainment purposes. I got completely transported by the music and the eerie atmosphere of the film.

It's more of a landscape that you let yourself get sucked into than a story that gets told to you.

You either love this or you hate it.

Chronopolis is an "art" film. If you are expecting a plot, action, dialogue, or ANYTHING then this movie is not for you. The movie is HIGHLY repetitive and reuses the same stock animations over and over again but just at different angles or lightings to pretend it is a different object or location. From an entertainment perspective: this movie is complete garbage. The movie's plot could've been written by a 3 year old: Immortals spend 30 minutes (not even joking, the first 30 minutes are nothing but this) creating a ball. Ball finds mountain climber. Mountain climber finds immortals. The end.

If you are looking for a plot, that is it. There is nothing more to the plot than that.

However, the movie is hypnotic to a certain degree. If you are looking for something unique and bizarre then this movie is for you. There really isn't anything quite like this. The repetitiveness becomes a norm and you start to understand how the film works. This is a movie that requires NO brain power at all. You just sit and watch. Anyone who tries to convince you that this movie has "deep, complex, or profound" imagery/themes is a complete liar. The point of the movie isn't to teach anyone anything. These kind of "art" films are designed for experience. What does the audience FEEL when they are watching it? What sensations come to the audience? What does this imagery invoke? That is the purpose of this film.

In short: This is a movie that is awful yet unique. If you like it then I understand your view; however, don't lie and say that this movie contains a "profound/complex" plot because it doesn't. Watch this film to experience something you aren't used to. If you can't get past the first 10 minutes then I doubt you can get through the next 50.

Well... I had a few hours to kill on a Monday night in Beijing, and I found that the French Culture Center was showing a movie about "a gargantuan city lurking in the sky, colonized by powerful immortals who have become jaded with eternal life." I was sold.

I don't want to be too harsh on the movie, because I do some small time video work myself. I will start out with saying the full 52 minutes version was possibly the worst movie I have ever seen. With that said, when I returned home and exclaimed to my roommates that I had seen the worst movie ever made they were in disbelief. I found an 11 minute shortened version that I showed to them. They actually liked it, and I conceded that this version wasn't too bad.

The short version reduced the excruciating pain of the long repetitive scenes down to 1 or 2 repetitions which made the film viewable and slightly interesting. I will say that Tool's "Schism" was much more bad ass in 7 minutes.

I would recommend this movie to anyone who wants to say with authority "I have seen the worst movie ever made". Kinda like that scene in Clockwork Orange where they have the guys eyelids wired open making him desensitized . I felt like less of a human walking out of that movie. More like a clay animation "icebox where my heart used to be". Plus I fell asleep for a few minutes in the middle...

After watching so many of Piotr Kamler's short abstract animated films on YouTube and UbuWeb, I finally saw his feature from the early '80s on the latter site. I read the synopsis on Wikipedia afterwards and while I got what was supposed to be understood as happening reading that, there was no way I would have figured that out if I just watched this cold. Knowing that the original version was 66 minutes and had narration by Michael Lonsdale (this version just had French text at the beginning), I half wondered if that might have made this viewing more enjoyable. As it was, the unusual visuals were what managed to keep my eyes open for the entire 52 minutes not to mention the electronic score by Luc Ferrari. Those visuals included many giant heads with headgear resembling those of the Egyptian pyramids, several black balls swirling together and apart, lots of mountain climbers on ropes, and one of them falling before flying with a large white ball helping him. Also that person and that ball walk and bounce with joy after becoming "friends". Okay, so on that note, Chronopolis is worth a look for anyone interested in these artistically unusual animated films.