Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro made a name for themselves with the visually distinct, hyper-stylized film Delicatessen - their follow up, the equally visually daring movie The City of Lost Children, delivered to the screen another deliriously bonkers scientist, this time one who is intent on stealing the dreams of children. Straddling surreal fantasy and steampunk-inspired science fiction, The City of Lost Children stars Ron Perlman as a sailor and harpooner by the name of One who sets out to rescue a child and in the process discovers the strange bio-mechanical kidnapping cult. The mad scientist Krank (a wonderfully over-the-top Daniel Emilfork) is rapidly aging on account of his inability to dream himself, and needs the dreams of children to stave off his imminent death. Krank is without a doubt one of the foulest, most demented mad scientists to have graced the screen, and The City of Lost Children, with its sinister mood and darkly inventive visual style, deserves the status of instant cult classic it has since earned. Such a shame, then, that Jeunet seemed to lose his knack for ingenuity by the time he came to filming Alien: Resurrection - although the pressures of the studio were perhaps as much to blame as anything.
