Leeloo Dallas multi-pass
The Fifth Element. Penned and directed by the masterful Luc Besson. The man behind what is probably my favourite film of all time; The Professional (Léon).
Unlike ‘The Professional’, I am actually able to get ‘The Fifth Element’ on DVD in Australia. Why Léon has never made it to region 4, or Australia in general will never make sense to me. And for every day that passes without this DVD in my collection, I die a little inside. It is available, see HERE, just not to us Aussies. I’m not bitter about it. I’m not bitter about not being able to own my favourite film of all time.. not at all. But anyway, that’s another story.. One paragraph and I’m already on a tangent.
I remember seeing The Fifth Element at the cinema. Its hard to believe that this year, it will be 10 years old. I remember queuing up for it outside of what was a pretty new and freshly refurbished Hoyts Cinema back then and standing in line with my mates, ticket held firmly in hand waiting to filter into the theatre. Excited to see just what all the hype was about. At US$80 million, the special-effects budget of the film was the highest of its time and was the most expensive film ever produced outside of Hollywood.
It didn’t disappoint then and it still doesn’t disappoint today. The special effects were amazing in 1997 and they are still amazing in 2007. Its a film that I’m confident will remain a timeless masterpiece. One of those films you’ll be able to show your kids in ten or twenty years time and they’ll still go ‘wow’ when the enormous flying hotel comes into orbit around Planet Fhloston and when the Mondoshawans first appear on screen.
The Fifth Element was so ahead of its time, it still looks and feels as fresh today in the current crop of movies as it ever did.
Luc Besson wrote the original screenplay for The Fifth Element when he was in high school. Quite incredible, considering in High School all I was concerned about was boobs and skipping classes to go to a mates place to watch The Jerry Springer Show (generally these two concerns were interrelated). I’m amazed that all this creativity and deep-seated issues could have come from the mind of a High School student.
The Divine language spoken in the film is an artificial language with only 400 words, invented by director Luc Besson and Milla Jovovich. In an interview with Jovovich included in the bonus feature “The Adventure and Discovery of a Film: The Story of the Fifth Element” on the DVD release of The Fifth Element (Ultimate Edition), Jovovich stated that she and Besson wrote letters to each other in the Divine Language as practice. By the end of filming they were able to have full conversations in this language.
And the little details that you miss the first time around and only pick up on the following views; like the name of the actor playing the cop in the driver’s seat waiting at the McDonald’s restaurant is ‘Mac McDonald’. Or when the President tells Father Vito Cornelius he has “twenty seconds” to state his point, Vito talks for exactly twenty seconds.
The number 5 appears in the movie on several obvious occasions. There are 5 elements. Zorg stops his bomb with 5 seconds remaining on the timer and the Mangalore’s bomb starts with a 5 second timer. Ruby Rhod, near the end of the movie after the alien planet is stopped, says, “There’s a bomb going off every 5 minutes!” and the doctor at the end says that Leeloo and Korben need 5 more minutes. Also Ruby Rhod’s show is at 5.
The explosion in the Fhloston main hall was the largest indoor explosion ever filmed. The resulting fire almost got beyond control.
And who could forget Ruby Rhod’s outrageous hair styles - and the enigmatic Diva scene.
The movie is so sleek and so well engineered, I struggle to think of a film so well put together. How one scene blends into another, compliments it, or contradicts it in a way as to humour or enlighten you.. Its just film making brilliance at the utmost of its potential.
Leeloo Dallas multi-pass!
The Fifth Element - on IMDB
The Fifth Element - Memorable quotes
The Fifth Element - Trivia
The Fifth Element - background at Wikipedia
