Jean-Pierre Jeunet and Marc Caro are world-class stylists who tend to be a little too cute for their own good. They’re artistic descendants of Terry Gilliam’s otherworldy vision and they’re a lot more clever than Tim Burton, with whom they share a live cartoon sensibility, but their first film is still an empty shell, a golden egg with nothing inside. On paper, this is a black comedy. A penniless ex-clown is hired on as the maintenance man in a crumbling tenement building, but the job is merely a front for the downstairs butcher to lure in fresh human meat for his knife. It’s entertaining until you realize that the jokes are mostly harmless light moments blowing feather-like toward cozy resolutions. There’s nothing to talk about afterward, no mystery, no point of view to inspire or infuriate. So, you end up focusing on the production design, which is great (and worth a look). It’s an alternate universe soundstage-bound France that at first suggests The Great Depression until you see television sets and modern day newscasts. Cinematographer Darius Khondji might be the real star of the show. His tones are earthy and yet full of atmosphere, a world that glows by the light of modest lamps and sunlight through grimy windows. Khondji went on after this to big Hollywood movies that includes multiple collaborations with the likes of David Fincher, Michael Haneke and Woody Allen.