"Entirely created in a studio, and set in a world plunged into endless twilight-cum-night, the film posits a kind of neo-Victorian, industrial society where David Lynch would feel at home. Though “Delicatessen” was seemingly set in the wrong part of town in the early ’50s, “City” is more like a Looney Tunes fantasy sprung from the head of Jules Verne. Setting is a multilevel smokestack port littered with industrial detritus, rusty tankers and the biggest collection of weirdos and humans since Tod Browning’s “Freaks.” Local heavies are the Cyclops, a Nietzschean sect of one-eyed fanatics who abduct young kids for crazed inventor Krank (Daniel Emilfork), an aging wizen who lives on a castle-like oil rig beyond a giant minefield."

"But with each frame filled to bursting point with visual detail and multiplaned design, plus razor-sharp cutting that often eliminates transitions, it’s not a movie you can afford to take your eyes off for a second. In addition, the major set-pieces are so breathtaking that it’s sometimes hard to remember afterwards where the characters were last positioned in the plot. Effects work, all done in France, is seamless, to the extent that some (such as the clones, all played by Pinon) effectively lose the awesomeness of being an effect. On a purely emotional level, it’s notable that the film’s most engaging moments are those when the filmers turned off the computers and simply came up with entrancing ideas."

"City of the Lost Children is just unbelievably bizarre when you watch it. The plot is a pretty simplistic good vs. evil ploy, but the city is the real star of the show. While it's funky urban-decay architecture and opaque green water is fascinating enough as it is, even more so are the inhabitants of the city. Here's a quick little list of what you'll see in this movie:"

"If "City of Lost Children" had been released then, the "2001: A Space Odyssey (film)" fans would have segued right across the street to take it in. Through the years there have been other such inspired films made for the eye: "Blade Runner," "Fantasia," "Days of Heaven," "Brazil," "El Topo," "Santa Sangre," "Akira" and indeed "Delicatessen" come to mind. I am trying to be rather precise here, because many people will probably not find themselves sympathetic to this movie's overachieving technological pretensions, while others will find it the best film in months or years. You know who you are. I am not one of you. But I have enough of you in me to pass along the word. Far out."

"A guy with a tattoo of a minefield on his head"

"If I were to judge this film solely on its visuals, it would get an unqualified rave, no questions asked. It's only when I start to think about the story and the tone that my enthusiasm inches downward, because it's done more as an exercise than as a narrative you're meant to care about. Maybe the ultimate destination of "City of Lost Children" isn't in movie theaters at all, but on one of those video wall panels like Bill Gates is installing in his new house; you'd see an amazing image every time you walked past, and occasionally you'd linger for as many more astonishing sights as you felt capable of absorbing. The movie is an expensive, high-tech French production, using more special effects than any other French film in history, and it is appropriate that a lot of its look seems inspired by that Parisian visionary, Jules Verne. It takes place not so much in the future (or even in the dated but vivid "future" as seen by Verne) as in a sort of parallel time zone, where there are recognizable elements of our world, violently rearranged. The co-directors, Marc Caro and Jean-Pierre Jeunet, created a similar visual extravaganza in their first feature, "Delicatessen," a 1991 fantasy about cannibalism."

"Circus strongman"

"Francois Hadji-Lazaro"

"Rufus ~ Peeler"

"From Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro, the distinctive French wunderkinder responsible for 1991's dazzling genre-bender Delicatessen, comes this similarly eye-popping effort, The City of Lost Children—a film at least equal to its predecessor in terms of sheer style, imagination, and invention, even if it doesn't hold together as well structurally. The movie follows the adventures of a brave nine-year-old girl who teams up with a gentle, simpleminded strongman in order to rescue her younger brother, who has been kidnapped, along with a handful of other kids, by a sad, rapidly aging old man named Krank, who uses his scientific genius to project himself into the world of the children's dreams in a vain attempt to liven up his dreadfully bleak existence on his secluded island fortress. The City of Lost Children fancies itself a fairy tale—albeit a dark and scary Brothers Grimm-styled one—and, were it not for a few isolated moments of icky violence and questionable sexual overtones, it would make a fine children's picture. However, in its current form, we have a movie charming enough to capture the simple magic of Méliès' A Trip to the Moon, yet high-tech enough to feature special-effects wizardry worthy of anything in Jurassic Park; sophisticated enough to grasp Terry Gilliam's jovial sense of cynicism, but wide-eyed enough to evoke a child's innocuous way of looking at things (even though it's still gleefully hip enough to swipe a sight gag from Stephen Sayadian's sexed-up “remake” of The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari). In short, we have a movie jam-packed with enough strange characters and wild mythologies for at least three films; ironically, therein lies both the picture's greatest strength and its most grating weakness. While it's undeniably wonderful to be presented with such a full palette, the sensory overload that inevitably occurs as the film progresses can't help but distance one from both the characters and the (admittedly marvelous) world they inhabit."

"Enrico Blasi"

"Anselma Dell'Ollo"

"Luciano Pallocchia"

"Achille Antonaglia"

"Stefania Casini - Feminist Actress"

"Francesca De Sapio"

"Abigail Clayton - Angelica (as Gail Lawrence)"

"Mimsy Farmer - Feminist Actress"

"Marcello Mastroianni - Luigi Nocello"

"James Coco - Andreas Flaxman"

"Avon Long - Miko"

"Geraldine Fitzgerald - Mrs. Toland"

"Ticky Holgado ~ ex acrobat"

"Jean-Louis Trirtignant ~ Uncle Irvin"

"[to Lafayette about the monkey] If you want him to live, you'll have to keep him warm."

"Gérard Depardieu - Gerard Lafayette"

"Nathalie Bernart"

"Sandra Monteleoni"

"Hey, Greenie. Good luck."

"You guys are nuts."

"I like her."

"Hey, Greenie."

"[Newt: How? H-h-how is this possible? We watched you die.] No, you left me to die. And if we hadn't found you when we did, you'd be dead right now."

"Yeah– nobody's perfect, man."

"I have to admit– I'd like some revenge."

"All right, listen up. I know you've all been through hell. I wish I could say our troubles are over– but we're not through this yet. WCKD's still out there. They're not giving up. 'Cause you got something they want. They took you because you're immune to a plague that's wiping out the human race– and they think you're worth sacrificing to find a cure. Well, I don't. So in two days, when we get this tub of rust seaworthy, we're getting the hell outta here. We're gonna go to a place where WCKD will never find you. A place you can start over. A place you can call home."

"We have come a long way together. So many have sacrificed– so much to make this place possible. Your friends– and your family. So here's to the ones who couldn't be here, here's to the friends we lost. This place is for you. It's for all of us. But this, this is for them. So in your own time, in your own way– come make your peace. And welcome to the Safe Haven!"

"You're lucky you found us at all. They had us on the move a lot. It felt like something big was happening."

"Am I missing something here? This is the same girl who betrayed us, correct? Same dick?"

"Do you ever get the feeling the whole world's against you?"

"I never thought I'd say it– I miss the Glade."

"All I know is– they kept talking about a city."