Irma Vep

Released Sep 28, 1996

1h 39m

Comedy

Drama

List

94%

48 Reviews

Tomatometer

71%

2,500+ Ratings

Audience Score

Washed-up French director René Vidal (Jean-Pierre Léaud) hopes to turn his career around with an update of "Les Vampires," a silent-era masterpiece about about a notorious ring of thieves, led by crafty female crook Irma Vep. René brings in Chinese star Maggie Cheung (Maggie Cheung) to play Vep, but unexpected roadblocks arise on the set. Maggie doesn't know French, she's pursued by obsessive lesbian crew member Zoe (Nathalie Richard) and her character's criminal ways begin to rub off on her.

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Critics Consensus

Starring a bewitching Maggie Cheung, Irma Vep is an evocative and reflexive satire of the filmmaking process that is bursting at the seams with an affection for cinema.

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Alyx Vesey

Bitch Media

Irma Vep is a magnificently varied film, integrating film footage, press interviews, gossip, and film's hurry-up-and-wait production schedule. Cheung in particular does a masterful job playing herself, at once transparent and opaque.

Jan 11, 2021

Full Review

Melissa Anderson

4Columns

An exhilarating film that happens to be about moviemaking itself, Olivier Assayas's sinuous, kinetic, waggish Irma Vep is an oblique, supremely enjoyable course in movie history.

Oct 9, 2020

Full Review

Keith Phipps

AV Club

A funny and fascinatingly open-ended look at the state of the art, Irma Vep is well worth a look.

Jun 16, 2020

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Eddie Harrison

film-authority.com

... one of the few films that capture the mixture of the mundane and the extraordinary that go into the making of even the most low-key film...

Rated: 4/5

Jan 29, 2024

Full Review

Brian Susbielles

InSession Film

The disastrous production is Assayas’ way of self-reflection to what France’s film history has become...

Mar 6, 2023

Full Review

Jas Keimig

The Stranger (Seattle, WA)

While films-within-films can be a worn-out trope, Irma Vep is a delightfully frenetic movie that takes its cues from jumpy, behind-the-scenes documentaries.

Feb 2, 2022

Full Review

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Alec B

An interesting commentary on French film culture as it existed in the 90s and using Cheung, an obvious outsider, as the movie's central figure allows that commentary to be accessible to everybody.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

02/21/24

Full Review

S R

Saw it for the cast and the premise. It was tedious and wasn't what I expected. Saw on TCM.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

10/19/23

Full Review

Dave S

Irma Vep is clearly the most un-Assayas-like film that director Olivier Assayas has ever made. Known for slow, pensive, meticulously crafted films, he lets loose with Irma Vep, a wild, erratic and wildly entertaining slagging of French film culture. Like Truffaut's Day for Night, it is essentially a film within a film. Maggie Cheung, playing herself, travels to Paris to join the production of the remake of prolific French filmmaker Louis Feuillade's silent film Les Vampires. From the get go, things begin to spiral out of control as egos clash and incompetence rules the day. Jerky handheld cameras give a sense of mayhem throughout. The performances are great, especially by Jean-Pierre Leaud as the demanding and unstable director. While the ending may leave some viewers cold and others may object to its helter skelter style, Irma Vep is worth watching for anyone interested in the process of movie making.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

04/17/23

Full Review

TheFilmReviewer 1

Breathtakingly awesome (there is no other word for it), Olivier Assayas imbues his love for cinema into a compelling 99 minute film with fantastic stars, pace, and dialogue.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

03/02/23

Full Review

Ravenswood R

Robert Altman Nashville style "slice of life" with the camera following people having "real" conversations. No real plot or story emerges from all these interactions. I suppose it is entertaining at times, but I could never catch gears with it and really know what was going on. It is satirizing something which I definitely don't know much about, so if you aren't a French film buff or know much about French culture surrounding films this is not going to be your bag.

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

02/08/23

Full Review

Audience Member

Maggie Chung plunges headlong into the fractious world of French cinema, all at once reverential, disillusioned, pretentious, ambition and pathetic. It's the mid-90's and the ideas have run out, the money's tight and it's time for a remake. Irma Vep, silent and surreal, almost unfilmable. The cast bounce off each other as the frustration of another futile homage hits the skids while Chung becomes the character and sails above the tension. Then the rushes, it's great.

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

02/12/23

Full Review

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Olivier Assayas

Director

Maggie Cheung

Self

Jean-Pierre Léaud

René Vidal

Nathalie Richard

Zoé

Antoine Basler

Journalist

Nathalie Boutefeu

Laure

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Synopsis

Washed-up French director René Vidal (Jean-Pierre Léaud) hopes to turn his career around with an update of "Les Vampires," a silent-era masterpiece about about a notorious ring of thieves, led by crafty female crook Irma Vep. René brings in Chinese star Maggie Cheung (Maggie Cheung) to play Vep, but unexpected roadblocks arise on the set. Maggie doesn't know French, she's pursued by obsessive lesbian crew member Zoe (Nathalie Richard) and her character's criminal ways begin to rub off on her.

Director: Olivier Assayas
Producer: Francois Guglielmi
Screenwriter: Olivier Assayas
Distributor: Zeitgeist Films, Fox Lorber
Genre: Comedy, Drama
Original Language: French (Canada)
Release Date (Theaters): Sep 28, 1996, Original
Release Date (Streaming): Dec 9, 2016
Box Office (Gross USA): $191.2K
Runtime: 1h 39m
Sound Mix: Dolby Digital, Surround
Aspect Ratio: 35mm, 1.66:1

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