If you’ve never heard of M. Hulot I envy you. First go out and buy Criterions 2 Disc version of Playtime. Then invite several friends over and start the screening early so you’ll have plenty of time to talk about how much you all enjoyed it. Then go out and get Trafic, M. Hulots Holiday and Mon Uncle and wish that director Jacques Tati had made more movies starring his eternally befuddled middle-class protagonist M. Hulot. This is comedy on a grand scale. Imagine a thinking mans Chaplin in the modern world and a quieter sense of slapstick and you begin to get the charming often hilarious quality that is the legacy of M. Hulot.

Each of the M. Hulot films puts the character in a modern but completely familiar set of situations where he is completely in over his head. In Playtime these all have to do with the city and all its modern advances in architecture, advertising and night life. In Trafic it’s the world of the car and, among other things automotive, our increasing attempts to treat them as if thy were a second home. No one ever looked more at home walking down the street and I can barely imagine anyone less picturesque behind the wheel of an automobile. Tatis sly suggestion that our machinery (or our supposed dependence on it) is something to at least maintain a sense of humor about is of course even more a message of today than when he first made his film.

This is a two-disc set bursting with exactly the sorts of extras one expects from Criterion. High def digital transfer comes as a welcome addition since sound is such an important factor in the films of Tati but a two-hour documentary?! Titled In the Footsteps of Monsieur Hulot this is certainly the most comprehensive overview and dissection of the beloved character available. Vintage interviews with the Trafic cast, an entire episode of Morceaux de bravoure and a new essay by Jonathan Romney round out an impressive set.