Capucine
Luis Nieto, 42 minutes, France/Japan
WHEN a capuchin monkey named Capucine is given to a quadriplegic man as a helper, it鈥檚 not long before people notice her passion for TV and cameras. In Luis Nieto鈥檚 documentary, we watch as a Japanese primatologist and film lover, Hirokazu Shibuya, hears of Capucine and brings her to a research centre in Japan that serves as a kind of film school for primates.
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This is where things grow increasingly odd. At the centre we see capuchins, chimps and other primates sport headphones and carry boom microphones and clapperboards. A group of chimps swing from a clock; pan out and we realise they are being directed and filmed by a monkey.
Capucine is quickly recognised as the most talented of the bunch and is given her own room in the facility where she watches King Kong and ET and plays Donkey Kong. Nieto鈥檚 comic timing in these scenes is genius.
The researchers design film equipment and editing software for Capucine to shoot her own film, and so she begins Oedipe, sitting in her director鈥檚 chair and barking orders at her human assistants through a tiny megaphone.
When Oedipe is complete, the researchers premiere it at the Clermont-Ferrand film festival in France, billing it as the first film ever directed by a monkey. The film is surreal, drawing on imagery from Capucine鈥檚 favourite films and video games and depicting the monkey鈥檚 desire to be reunited with her owner.
Oedipe receives mixed reviews 鈥� some see it as nothing but 鈥渃ut and paste鈥� work, others as a stunningly original and modern work of art. Whatever your take on Oedipe, Capucine is one of the more entertaining films I have seen in quite some time.