L'illusionniste

This is a French-British animated cartoon adapted from a script by Jacques Tati with a vaudeville magician main character who looks and moves very much like Tati. Like Tati's films, it is basically a silent, with a few miscellaneous lines and mumblings here and there. It's a very pleasant if wistfully melancholy look at the dying era of live music hall entertainment, set in 1959. The action starts in Paris, and as our protagonist goes on tour it moves to London and then Scotland, where it remains for the rest of the picture. There he meets a young hotel maid who latches onto him like a father figure and the pair try to survive on what he can earn.

It's a nice little film that should have gotten more recognition (it was nominated for the Best Animated Feature Oscar) but the fact that it's a cartoon but essentially a drama (despite frequent droll Tati-style humor) was likely too confusing for mainstream cineplex audiences to wrap their heads around. Tati fans will appreciate the bit where the guy walks into a movie theatre playing MON ONCLE.

"The Illusionist" was good, but I don't see what the great reviews were about. (I agree with a previous writer who compared all the glowing reviews to "The Emperor's New Clothes.")

The animation was, indeed, subtle and exquisite, but I couldn't get into the story. Maybe the story itself was too subtle for me. Maybe I expected too much, since I thought "The Triplets of Belleville" (same director; hand-drawn animation) was one of the best movies I had ever seen.

I felt no connection with either the man or the girl. The other characters popped in and out so quickly that they were almost forgettable. And the ending was unsatisfying.

If I had seen this first, it would not have prompted me to see 'The Triplets of Belleville'.

NOTE: This is NOT a movie for children.

It was my great privilege to be invited to the world premiere of Sylvain Chomet's follow up to Belleville Rendez-Vous.

Set in Edinburgh and produced by an old pal of mine, Bob Last, I had very high expectations indeed. Not least because it is not every day that one of the world's most beautiful cities (my own) would be caught in artful majesty for years to come. And indeed it was. Edinburgh is a real star of this charming but very slight movie.

The city shimmers throughout, but the story sadly does not. It reminded me of a novel by Irish writer, William Trevor, called Felicia's Journey in which a young girl is taken into the trust of an older man. In that book (and subsequent film starring Bob Hoskins) and this, there is a slight air of seediness. (That's maybe going too far in the case of The Illusionist but the comparison was palpable for me.) Why the protection? What are the man's motives? I found it mildly uncomfortable. The fact is, in neither case are the intentions, apparently, anything more than protective; but somehow the feeling persists in both that all may not be as it seems.

Belleville Rendez-Vous arrived on the film scene like a bolt from the blue. This, sadly, suffers from that difficult second film syndrome. It oozes class and charm from every pore. It looks sublime. But the story (a Jaques Tati cast off) fails to deliver. It simply does not have the muscle to sustain 90 minutes of screen time.

A real shame because it has a great deal of merit.

Heart? 8/10.

Head? 6/10

In 1959 Paris, Tatischeff's old magic tricks with his vicious chubby white rabbit are not exciting the crowds anymore. He is slowly losing jobs and working in worst venues. Performing in London, he accepts an invitation to a remote Scottish island. He befriends Alice. He moves on to Edinburgh and is followed by Alice who thinks he possesses real magic.

There is a melancholy feel throughout this movie punctuated by moments of charming light comedy. The magician's world is slowly fading away. It does take something out of you. The animation is old fashion. It is very touching and full of lost. This is a sad poignant movie.

Sylvain Chomet's long-awaited follow-up to The Triplets of Belleville adapts an unfilmed screenplay by French master Jacques Tati. Chomet's film doesn't feel much like a Tati film, though - it's very much a Chomet film. But that's okay. I wouldn't want some poor director to feel he has to ape another filmmaker's style. The Illusionist follows a vaudeville magician, modelled after Tati (and called Tatischeff, which was Tati's real last name). He's old, and his world is starting to fade. He leaves France for an extended tour of Britain. Eventually he finds his way to a remote Scottish island, where he meets up with a young woman, Alice. When Tatischeff leaves the island, the girl coyly follows him, and he pretty much adopts her. The two go to Edinburgh (or a fictionalized, Edinburgh-like city) and Tatischeff gets a regular job at a theater (and another at a gas station, secretly, at night) so he can provide the girl with the beautiful clothes she desires (having existed in squalor on the island, she has never seen dresses as beautiful as she does in the city).

The biggest resemblance that it bears to Tati's films, besides the Tati caricature at its center, is the fleeting, impossible romance between the man and the girl. All four of the M. Hulot films contain this element to one degree or another. In The Illusionist, the relationship falls somewhere between the analogous romances in M. Hulot's Holiday and Mon Oncle. In Mon Oncle, there is a teenage girl who has a crush on M. Hulot, but he knows he's far too old for her and treats her in an avuncular fashion. In M. Hulot's Holiday, he is quite a bit older than the blonde, who is frequently bothered by boys her own age, but at least he has a chance. In The Illusionist, Tatischeff is an old man. He does love the girl. He can keep her, but can never have her. She essentially isn't any different than his rabbit - living its life in a cage. When it's free, it's only going to bite his finger when he gets too close.

The film does not contain much in the way of the grotesque oddities that fueled The Triplets of Belleville. It is much subtler, gentler, and more beautiful. It has a grace all its own. It can be very funny when it wishes. Chomet has obviously spent years on this film, and it looks spectacular. Even if he had made only The Triplets of Belleville, his reputation amongst cinematic animators would be secure, but The Illusionist puts him very near the top of the list of the greatest who ever lived.