The Klein aesthetic is everywhere in evidence in Louis Malle's Zazie dans le Metro-the most freewheeling of the New Wave films, on which Klein served as "visual director." His keen eye on Parisian streetlife and nightlife, his fascination with metamorphosing characters and his penchant for cut-up cutting all make their mark on Malle's ingenious solution to the problem of filming Raymond Queneau's "unfilmable" novel. Eleven-year-old Zazie comes to Paris to visit her uncle and ride the Metro, which is closed due to a strike, so she must take to the streets. Beginning with the pert little girl (Catherine Demongeot) who is blithely foul-mouthed; her uncle (Philippe Noiret at the beginning of his brilliant career), by night a female impersonator; and moving on to a string of variously compelling and corrupt individuals, nobody is what he seems-or at least not for long. Malle finds the cinematic equivalent of Queneau's punning style in an orgy of outrageous sight-gags, in-jokes, film parodies, visual games, changing speeds and wild stunts. The use of breakneck editing in particular marked a new era in film technique, but in all departments Zazie is a funny, magical journey through the looking glass.