Homework.

moimoichan6

It begins like a 70's Road Movie filmed by Antonioni and it ends like Gus Van Saint's "Gerry" with robots instead of humans. "Electroma" is an experimental trip that supposedly completes Daft Punk's last album : "Human after all" like "Interstella 5555" completed "Discovery" (but the two projects, beside their experimental faces, are here merely link one with another, whereas the last movie had strong connections with the album and the video clips). Here's a few things to know before watching this movie if you don't want to be too surprise or disappointed : it has absolutely no dialogs in it, the story is linear and simple and allows long experimental and contemplative sequences and the soundtrack isn't made by Daft Punk (even if it's omnipresent and very good : Brian Eno, Sebastien Tellier, Gregory Allegri...).

The movie is clearly divided in three parts, each lasts approximately 20 minutes long, except the desert part, which may be a little bit longer (but that may be a subjective impression...)

SUBJECTIVE DESCRIPTION OF THE MOVIE.

The first part is a road movie, with a video clip's editing style, where you see the two Daft Punk Robots traveling across the California desert. The references of the musicians are clearly shown here : the movie effectually looks like a crossover between "2001, a space Odyssey" and "Easy Rider", with robots in a big black car. The scene is rather pleasant, very aesthetically, and seems like a long and beautiful video clip d'auteur or like a 70's art video.

The second part is a mix between "THX 1138" and a grotesque horror movie, with the Daft Punk arriving in a typically American city full of robots, where they experience a operation, that transforms them to human, after all. They come out of the laboratory with caricature faces, and walk through the city, where the other robots stare at them with their surprised artificial eyes. But their carnival figures melt like ice-cream in the sun, and they have to get ride of them rather rapidly, and to become the Daft Punk again.

The last part fallows the two robots in the desert, where they walk and walk, and walk again (they're robots, they're never tired or hungry, they can walk endlessly...). There's then this secession of desert's frames, finishing with Courbet's "L'Origine du monde", that is rather ridiculous, but wakes the spectator up (I have to say that the movie is released in one Theatre in Paris, and has a unique weekly projection the Saturday at midnight !).

SPOILER AHEAD (even if it's merely a narrative movie).

Then, the two robots get tired of walking and even of living a robot's life : one explodes in a "Zabriskie Point"'s style, the other becomes the Human Torch (or the Robot Torch).

END OF TELLING THE END OF THE MOVIE.

The all thing is a pleasant but rather unoriginal (too many references) experimental movie, that links video clip with artistically experience and cinema.

score 5/10

moimoichan6 13 April 2007

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1638438/