Delicatessen ★★★ 1992 (R)

Set in 21st-century Paris, this hilarious debut from directors Jeunet and Caro focuses on the lives of the oddball tenants of an apartment building over a butcher shop. Although there is a famine, the butcher shop is always stocked with fresh meat—made from the building's tenants. Part comedy, part horror, part romance, this film merges a cacophony of sights and sounds with intriguing results. Watch for the scene involving a symphony of creaking bed springs, a squeaky bicycle pump, a cello, and clicking knitting needles. In French with English subtitles. 95m/C VHS, DVD . FR MarieLaure Dougnac, Dominique Pinon, Karin Viard, Jean-Claude Dreyfus, Ticky Holgado, Anne Marie Pisani, Edith Ker, Patrick Paroux, Jean-Luc Caron; D: JeanPierre Jeunet, Marc Caro; W: Gilles Adrien, Jean-Pierre Jeunet, Marc Caro; C: Darius Khondji; M: Carlos D'Alessi. Cesar '92: Art Dir./Set Dec., Writing.

del·i·ca·tes·sen / ˌdelikəˈtesən/ • n. a store selling cold cuts, cheeses, and a variety of salads, as well as a selection of unusual or foreign prepared foods. ∎  a counter or section within a supermarket or grocery store at which a range of such foods is available. ∎  foods of this type collectively.

delicatessen Ready‐to‐eat foods such as cooked meats, salami, pickled and smoked fish, salads, olives, etc. Also used as the name for the shop where such foods are sold. From the German delikat Essen, ‘fine foods’.