On the Triplets of Belleville
I saw a French animation tonight called "The Triplets of Belleville." It's part of the Boston Film Festival that's going on this week. The "Festival" itself seems to be hidden away in the farthest corners of the cinema, underpublicized and altogether invisible, but that's another matter...
I went to see this flick because I'd
read:
If it weren't unseemly to gush, this review would tell you flat out that Sylvain Chomet's "The Triplets of Belleville" is done with so much creativity and skill that it's among the best animated features ever made. Embracing superlatives, we'd say there's everlasting magic in Chomet's witty French-Canadian-Belgian union of cartoon minds, because "Triplets" takes the best of classic inspirations and transcends them, even more effectively than did Hayao Miyazaki's "Spirited Away."
There'd be equal praise for the darkly involving story, which finds a clubfooted madame coaching her grandson to enter the Tour de France, unaware that kidnappers lie in wait at the race to smuggle him into slave labor. Conveyed in hand-drawn 2-D and 3-D animation, it's captivating enough that you'll hardly notice almost no words are spoken.
Though it's probably too European to snuggle up to most American youngsters, this film is so good that it would be right to tell you it's the one festival entry not to miss. Only it's unseemly to gush.
Now, I've known for some time that A&E reviews in Boston rags are almost always way off, but tonight I fell for it. I'm ashamed. Yes, the movie is done with skill, wit, blah blah, but it's not comparable to Miyazaki's work, not at all. In the end it's just a feature-length short film. It's cute and peppered with some chuckles (exploding frogs, an indestructible dog, a slow-speed car chase) but with hardly any of that dreamy What-the-Hell-is-Going-on-Here stuff that makes Miyazaki unique. In fact, it's so laden with cynical commentary about obese Americans I got distracted from the story. Sure, the movie's fun and hundreds of people had to stay up late to make it, whatever that's worth, but to say it's better than "Spirited Away" is just not fair.
So what I'm saying is, I'm pissed off at the write-up, not the movie. I don't like being disappointed by good things. The movie is good. Boston film critics are little jerks.
* Ray, 9/11/2003 10:59:34 PM
