Mon Oncle (Jacques Tati, 1958)

Tati’s Mon oncle is the most serene of viewing experiences, constantly and uninsistently funny, almost mystically precise in its framing and design and effects. In a different film, the portrayal of a modern bourgeois France stifling its sense of joy and spontaneity through its materalism and pretensions might seem oppressive and hectoring, and the contrast with the traditional community and its sense of messy togetherness might seem largely sentimental: Tati holds them in a beautifully contrasting equilibrium (his Hulot bridges the two worlds, the unemployed if not unemployable uncle to the son of a wealthy factory manager). Some of the film’s most sublime ideas are its smallest, such as Hulot’s routine of adjusting the angle of his open windows to direct the sunlight onto the caged bird below and therefore to maximize its singing: it’s through such tiny rituals and pleasures, you sense, that a worthwhile life is built (although the nature of Hulot’s inner life can only be guessed at). In this sense, there’s a commonality between the two worlds, except that at the other end of the spectrum, the routines have become oppressive and self-defeating – supposed technological breakthroughs that cause more problems than the simpler methods they’re replacing, or absurd affectations like the fish-shaped garden fountain that the lady of the house obsessively switches on whenever a visitor arrives (unless it’s Hulot, or a delivery person, or someone else of insufficient status) and then off again as soon as they leave. The movie ultimately suggests that the battle is effectively lost, banishing Hulot to the provinces, and subtly suggesting – through a subsequent moment of rare bonding between father and son – that maybe it’s time to cut the sentiment and commit to new normals (and onward to Tati’s next film, the imposing Play Time), leaving all the rest to the dogs. And by the way, you’ll seldom see such well-cast and -directed dogs either…