The Extraordinary Adventures of Adele Blanc-Sec

THE EXTRAORDINARY ADVENTURES OF ADELE BLANC-SEC is the latest movie from the normally reliable French director Luc Besson, and sad to say it's a complete piece of nonsense. Apparently the big-screen adaptation of some popular French comic books, this sees the titular character embarking on a whimsical fantasy adventure involving dinosaurs and mummies. It's as silly as it sounds, but I had hoped for some exotic, globe-trotting intrigue - after all, we mustn't forget that the French are the ones who brought us the wonderful TINTIN comics, after all. But this turns out to be an oddball affair through and through, with the humour aimed at a distinctly juvenile audience and yet adult scenes elsewhere. Sadly, this is one of those films that delights in sub-par CGI animation, so the pterodactyl scenes are pretty naffy. The nadir comes with a pair of CGI animated gorillas - don't expect RISE OF THE PLANET OF THE APES style quality here, these two are horrendous and it makes me wonder about the state of film-making when it's cheaper to animate two gorillas than to simply visit the zoo and film them with a traditional camera. There are many familiar French faces in the cast, including Mathieu Amalric (MUNICH) and Giles Lellouche (POINT BLANK), but most play caricatures hidden beneath prosthetics and make-up. Louise Bourgoin's titular heroine is a real bitch of a character, somebody who's rude and hateful to everybody around her, so that makes her hard to warm to. In fact, the only stuff I enjoyed in this film were the reanimated mummies, who are genuinely funny and wacky creations. Everything else is a chore.

"Les aventures extraordinaires d'Adèle Blanc-Sec" is just the kind of movie you would like to see after a day of hard work. It's funny, crazy without being stupid, rich in adventure. This zany comedy may not be faithful to the original comic (I haven't read it) and the story is hardly believable but it's certainly entertaining with nice costumes, beautiful sets from early 20th century Paris and good actors.Children ten or older will love the adventure thing in the movie, with dinosaurs, talking mummies and secret Egyptian tombs. Weird, freaky, sometimes a little bit scary and always funny. Louise Bougoin(Adèle) is beautifully charming, clever and funny, as well as the rest of the cast. This movie has got a little "Amélie Poulain" feeling with its fantasy, and if the plot isn't very credible, I still had a very good time watching it for it's always surprising and hilarious.

This movie is boring. The story never takes off. It is a cross between "Amelie" and "Indiana Jones" but not a good one. The main character is only sort of likable. The supporting characters are not interesting. The whole thing comes across as sort of ideological. Luc Besson seems like a real chump. I almost walked out but the area around the movie theater where I saw it is kind of dangerous at night and I didn't want to leave alone. I was mugged there a few weeks ago. Had I seen it in a different theater I would have walked out. I had other stuff to say but now that I'm home I'd rather read my book than spend any more time writing about this movie. I forgot what I wanted to say anyway.