My Favorite Tati Scene - The Lookout #17

An analysis of my all-time favorite Tati scene , from M. Hulot's Holiday (1953).
The Lookout is a series of video essays about movies, culture, and history. I’m really excited to share these videos with you. Let me know what you think in the comments!

[@jon780249]

Tati was a comic genius. I have seen his films so many times, but still laugh out loud each time. We are blessed he left us these moments of laughter.

[@danieljames1196]

What i also thought was great about the scene, is scene after where he is back at his hotel playing table tennis and continuing his clear love for the game and continuing his great winning streak .

[@JH-lo9ut]

This is the best scene, but another scene I love, where things actually go Hulot's way, is the party at the hotel: Hulot (of course) is the only one to dress up for the masquerade, in a really silly pirate costume. But then it turns out that the beautiful woman who he has a crush on, also has a costume! And Tati doesn't do the obvious, he doesn't turn Hulot into an socialt awkward fool in this scene. Hulot actually behaves like a perfect gentleman, they dance and they genuinely seem to have a good time together. It's such a cute scene. I guess we've seen this very setup and payoff in later films but that doesn't take away from the fact it is so great.

[@rolandscales9380]

It's observational comedy, and being neuro-divergent myself (I suspect Tati was too) I find the film's themes of alienation, alternative perceptions, locomotive quirks and social ineptitude strike a chord.

[@alexjbennett1017]

I saw a Hulot film for the first time last week -- "Holiday." I enjoyed the whole thing, but the tennis scene you start out with was somehow the funniest and most memorable for me. The way he shoves the racquet forward and backward like a frying pan is fantastic physical humor -- it looks like his whole body is involved in the motion. And the absurdity of his thinking he could master tennis skills in a second -- and because as you say, nothing ever goes his way, the double absurdity (and delicious satisfaction) that he trounces his opponents. His style reminds one of other greats of physical comedy -- Chaplin, of course -- but there seems something intricate, nuanced and unsparing about Tati. I just wish I better understood French middle class leisure culture of 1953.

[@rolandscales9380]

That's my favourite sequence too.

[@WeebRevolution]

I've never seen tennis skills on that level. It was cool to learn about Tati, great video!

[@thelookout1613]

I'm glad you enjoyed it. Thanks for watching.

[@rolandscales9380]

I recommend Jacques Tati's "Evening class" short, in which he demonstrates how to fall upstairs, how to imitate a horseman, and so on. Everything is minutely observed, rehearsed and imitated. He must have been an excellent dancer to have mastered the art of dancing badly. He must also have been a consummate horseman.

[@405atelier]

also the way he sees the parallel between little children and dogs

[@eddieibarra356]

Rowan Atkinson better known as Mr Bean was influence by Jacques Tati films.

[@soliv27]

I was about to say there must be some link between this two geniuses! First time I saw Mr Bean, at the exam, there was no recorded laughing, it was a short movie before the main, I couldn't stop laughing, it was such an amazing encounter!