The City of Lost Children

The City of Lost Children

Released in 1995 by directors Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, The City of Lost Children is a surrealistic fantasy film set in an unnamed port city, in which children seem to be vanishing into thin air. One, played by Ron Perlman, is an ex-sailor turned street performer who loses his best friend in a fatal stabbing during one of their performances. That night, One is attacked by a group of men referred to as the "Cyclops", who then proceed to kidnap his adopted little brother. One chases after them, but fails to catch up to their vehicle, and instead runs into a gang of orphans called The Thieves Guild, who are sent by the conjoined twins known as the octopus to steal money and jewelery from the unsuspecting people around town. Later, One finds himself working with the thieves guild where he meets Miette, a little girl who may have information on the possible whereabouts of the kidnapped child.

Far away on an ocean rig, there is a scientist named Krank (played by Daniel Emilfork) who lives with a small woman named Martha, his six identically cloned brothers, and Irvin who is simply a brain living in an aquarium. Due to his inability to dream, Krank is aging at an alarming rate, so in order to stop this he has built a machine that can suck out the dreams of children. He and his clones pay the Cyclops' in body augmenting equipment, to steal children for them. The children are then transported to the rig and hooked up to the machine where Krank invades their minds. The only problem is, that these poor children are so scared that all of their dreams are nightmares, which are useless to Krank. Throughout the film, Krank is figuring out a way to give these kids happy dreams, however he continuously fails miserably, until he meets One's little brother who is not scared of the terrifying scientists. Krank concludes that this is the child that he is been looking for and attempts to take his youth.

Much of the films creepyness comes from the variety of skewed angles chosen to film the villains. I noticed that whenever One, Miette, or any of the kids were on screen alone, the camera was still and "normal". But whenever any villain stepped foot into the frame, the camera would warp, bend, or take very dramatic closeups giving them a more sadistic and disgusting look. Take a look at Krank during one of his nightmares...

Or this one, where he is confronting one of the children about his nightmare...

There was also a dream sequence, in which a gang of Santa Claus invade a childs dream and everything becomes warped and confusing, it was like a mushroom trip gone bad. That scene actually gave me a bit of nausea, but I think that was the whole point, to make me uneasy.

Daniel Emilfork did a fantastic job of playing the sadistic villain Krank. I particularly enjoyed his facial expressions throughout since he has such a unique looking face, combined with his long and slender limbs and the skewed camera angles, he just oozed evil. Perlman did an excellent job as well, considering that he didn't know a single word of French. According to the films Wikipedia page, director Marc Caro had to phonetically recite all of Perlmans lines in order for him to deliver them correctly. The children did an excellent job as well, even though half of them were being tortured by an evil Santa.  

 Theres a lot more to talk about when it comes to this film, however I find it difficult to say anything else without spoiling the rest of it. Do yourself a favor and watch this movie, its really good.