Paul is a sweet man-child, raised — and smothered — by his two eccentric aunts in Paris since the death of his parents when he was a toddler. Now thirty-three, he still does not speak. Paul's aunts have only one dream for him: to win piano competitions. Although Paul practices dutifully, he remains unfulfilled until he submits to the interventions of his upstairs neighbour. Suitably named after the novelist, Madame Proust offers Paul a concoction that unlocks repressed memories from his childhood and awakens the most delightful of fantasies.
The film is a colourfully staged Parisian fairy tale where memory and fantasy flow together and music nearly replaces speech. It is playful, melancholic and full of oddball characters, with musical set pieces recalling Chomet's animated work. The pace is unhurried, the tone somewhere between childhood longing and quiet comedy.
Good for you if you like dreamy, handcrafted outsider stories with music and offbeat humour.
Written with AI, based on TMDb data.