French actor Dominique Pinon is completely underrated. He’s a clown in the Chaplin sense, gifted with an acutely expressive face that quietly steals the show while characters around him scream for attention. If you’ve seen Delicatessen or The City of Lost Children you can’t forget his silly and sensitive performances. When I heard Pinon was to star in the American short Lift, I pined over the years it took the DVD to come out. And even with such anticipation, it exceeds every expectation.

Pinon plays an elevator operator who never leaves his shaft. He has his eye on a shy office worker who always takes the stairs. Simple set-up and a simple plot, but it’s played out quite inventively. Every scene is magic and whimsy, with lots of subtle background touches. The setting owes a great debt to Brazil, all beautiful industrial deco. Dialogue is kept to a minimum, letting us focus on the clever comic choreography. Just half an hour, Lift is the perfect length (something I wish studios would consider in this trend of over-long blockbuster fluff) and the DVD has plenty of meaty extras.

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