Point of View

Point of View

Le Fairy Tale

As you might expect from a film called Amélie, it's about a woman named Amélie, and she is in pretty much every scene in the movie. While there are some subplots, like the romance between Georgette and Joseph, most of them have almost no bearing at all on the overall story arc, which follows Amélie on her Finding Nino quest—that is, her quest to find love for herself, a quest she didn't even know she was on until she fell in love.

There is also an unseen male narrator who introduces the movie and often explains what's going in Amélie's overactive imagination. He has a nice, soothing voice, like a French version of Jim Dale, the guy who reads the Harry Potter audiobooks and narrates Pushing Daisies.

The narrator adds to the fairy-tale feel of the film, creating a mood where you feel like anything can happen. And fairy tales often feature their heroines in the title—Snow White, Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood—you name it. Although Amélie isn't avoiding big bad wolves or searching for supernatural footwear, she is on a somewhat magical quest for love, with the narrator guiding us all through it.