Independent Animation 11 Nov 2010 08:53 am
My Thoughts on The Illusionist
- Last night, I saw Sylvain Chomet‘s film, The Illusionist. I truly thought it was brilliant – acting more as a film than an animated film. At the moment it feels like one of the better films this year. I think I need to see it another time or two for me to write about it properly, but I’ll try here, anyway.
First let me talk about Chomet’s first feature, The Triplettes of Belleville. The promo for that film, online, was the first 3 or 4 minutes of the film. A wild takeoff of some thirties style animation that beat to the rhythm of the Oscar nominated song from the film. In the feature, this promo turned out to be a television image that the two leads watched in their small house. Immediately, you were into the story of a mother (grandmother?) helping her child who’s devoted to bicyce riding. They spend all their efforts on his career with a lifetime of training for the Tour de France. The film has such a wonderful sense of design, you’re spending much of your time ignoring the fine animation in front of you to take in the details on the backgrounds.
For a while, that movie worked wonderfully for me. Characters are fully and wonderfully developed – without dialogue. However, I think it goes wrong at the point where the bike riding boy is kidnapped and taken to Belleville. Even when you get to Belleville, you have to be taken by the scenery.
But the story has gone askew. Some gang types have kidnapped the boy to run a faked indoor race for the sake of gambling. Grandma, with the help of the singing triplettes of Belleville, rescues the boy and kill off the gang’s members. The gang members are a difficult design to swallow: square-backed look-a-like creatures that merge into one another with their modular form. They’re the only characters in the film not based on human form, and they come off as unacceptable, for my taste. I’d already left the story, the design of these characters pushed me out of the film.
It was Chomet’s first feature. It had its shortcomings but was still the best animated feature I’d seen in years.
Now Chomet has completed his second feature, and has far eclipsed what he’d done before it. It possibly helps that the film was written by Jacques Tati just prior to his death and sat unmade since 1959. The form, the structure, and indeed the style all came courtesy of Tati. And the results are beautiful and excellent. The animation, the best done in many years, comes courtesy of Chomet, and it is brilliant.
Prior to seeing this film, many evocative clips were placed on line. Like the one longer clip for Belleville, these had my mouth salivating for great 2D animation. Triplettes didn’t quite make it; the clips for this film give us the mood of The Illusionist, but the actual feature goes all the way and more.
Prior to seeing this film, I’d read several very positive reviews from professional critics in papers such as The Guardian, Movieline, and Variety.
There were also the reviews from snarky commentors like the one who talked about wanting to walk out on all three viewings. (Hint: you don’t go to a film three times wanting to walk out on all three! Something is suspect. This review was placed verbatim on several sites.)
But then there is also the on-line review by the astute Mark Mayerson at his website calling the film: “Chomet’s best film yet, one that combines his eccentrics with a melancholy tale of age and youth.”
Undeniably, the film moves at a relaxed, comfortable pace. It doesn’t try to be the wham-bam-loud screaming films Pixar and Dreamworks make. It moves slowly and naturally like a Jacques Tati film. The humor isn’t hard-edged and in your face à la How To Train Your Dragon or Toy Story 3. The characters don’t scream their dialogue (the habit of animation films for the past twenty years or so); in fact they don’t have any dialogue.
The action is done mostly in mime. A word is heard every so often, but they’re irrelevant. This was also Chomet’s scheme in Triplettes, and it worked well. Music is at the heart of his animation. However, it doesn’t feel completely natural here – a touch forced. I thought if there were a scene in the beginning where the magician and his ward spoke different languages to each other. If she spoke Hungarian and he French, and there were no interpretation, both the principal characters and the audience would be left out, for the most part.
The young girl follows him to the point where he feels obligated to take care of her, almost adopting her temporarily. This point seemed to bother several people I talked with. Richard O’Connor on his blog Asterisk Pictures takes exception to it and questions its political correctness. I found it completely innocent and had NO problem whatsoever. However, Mark Mayerson nicely compares it to Chaplin’s Limelight. There, an older performer takes care of a young ballet dancer. It’s a smart association to have made. I also saw other films in there. Just this Tuesday I’d watched Local Hero Bill Forsyth’s little gem of a film. The mood was perfect in both films showcasing the Scottish countryside. The backgrounds, the animation, the lighting, the delicacy of the direction (rarely are CloseUps found – it’s all establishing and Long Shots. There’s a grand scheme here. It’s a wonderful film.
An excellent interview with Chomet was printed in The Guardian just prior to the film’s unveiling at the Edinburg Film Festival back in June. I encourage you to read the whole. This is a small quote from it on the Disney/Dreamworks statements about the death of 2D animation: “. . . American reflex to kill off the competition, to say that you can only do it one way and destroy everything else that went before. The whole society is like that. They destroy what they have to build something new. They end up with no roots to draw on, nothing to compare their work with to see if it is good or not. American culture is in real danger of starving itself to dead. You just have to see what Hollywood is producing to see how narrow it is getting.”
Mayerson said:
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“Some films become touchstones; they remain part of the conversation years after their release. For some part of the animation community, The Illusionist will be a touchstone.”
I can’t put it better, and I can’t say any louder that this is undeniably, to me, the best animated feature I’ve seen in, at least, the last 10 years. It’ll eventually reach you. It opens Christmas Day in NY & LA to qualify for the Oscar. It’ll come to your town in 2011.
See it if you love animation and/or film.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 9:53 am 1.Mark Mayerson said …
Glad that you liked it, Michael. I’ve already written a more detailed defense of the film that I’ll hold until it goes into wider release.
It’s a shame that the film is trickling out in North America instead of having a coordinated release. I’m afraid that’s going to hurt the film’s box office and also dilute the film’s impact on the animation community.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 10:35 am 2.Michael said …
The animation community, as far as I can see, won’t like this film. Person after person has already told me they think it’s too slow or flat, or the girl’s a problem, or the animation is too realistic for the caricatured characters. A lot of excuses to say that Attention Deficit Disorder has hurt our business in more ways than one. They need those bold climaxes and more of them. These days SNOW WHITE is too slow.
People don’t remember how to sit through a slower paced film despite its brilliance. A film has to be cut wildly with split screens and a lot of things coming at you to make it work. Compare THE ILLUSIONIST with 127 HOURS. In one a lot happens and it is all long shots (John Ford anyone?) and a relaxed pace. The other nothing happens and the camera is everywhere – mostly in tight closeups – and short scenes cut together. Don’t want to lose anyone’s attention.
I do believe you were right. This film is one for posteritiy, and it will hold up well.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 11:33 am 3.Richard O'Connor said …
I agree there is a lot to like in terms of form.
It’s a formally beautiful film -with some exception, like the unmotivated return of the bar owner at the end.
For me the content, like Triplettes of Belleville, is lackluster.
I don’t see how it’s a stretch to find the Magician’s relationship to the girl sexualized and troubling. He dresses her like a little vamp, buys her make up, creepily peers at her while she sleeps and ultimately rejects her when she chooses another suitor.
All of that could make for an interesting film -in fact, it should be the heart of the story. But the filmmaker tries to brush it under the rug with bravado animation and stellar art direction. It’s replaced with a story of whimsy. Whimsy is nice, but it’s no substitute for the pathos which the set up made possible.
Like the bicyclist in Belleville, the girl is practically repulsive in her dependency on the Parent Figure -but at least the bicyclist takes action in that film. Here she’s the protagonist (the titular “Illusionist” for a generous reading) and she does absolutely nothing beyond getting picked up by an old man and then picked up by a boy roughly her age.
If it the film fares poorly, it would be unfair to pin in the dullness of our age instead of the dullness of the characters developed within it.
The pacing, the art direction -all the trappings are superb. But again, it’s yet another animated film that expects you to leave humming the scenery.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 11:58 am 4.john dilworth said …
I cannot praise this film more Michael. I agree with you and Mark. It has been a long pause since I last was moved by our hand made craft, and it may have been Chomet again. I could not take my eyes off how the protagonist moved. I was reminded of Chaplins’ signature “condition”. How often I’ve cried out to talent to see their characters as something without a duplicate, that has a skeleton with secret restraints. I love how The Illusionist ends with the individual act of anarchy in a world of conformity. Like Williams’ thief stealing the film at the end of Cobbler. And any suspicions about the intentions of the older gentleman for the young lady, think more of it as a natural extension of his magic, something that “doesn’t exist” anymore. Michael, were you thinking of Edgar while watching The Illusionist? I’ll just go bananas if not.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 12:17 pm 5.Eric Noble said …
I’m interested in seeing this movie. It definitely has me intrigued. Hopefully it comes to Seattle soon. I agree with Mark that this film should get a wider release here in the States. That way more people know about it.
I’m going to watch a few Jacques Tati films beforehand to get a grasp of his work.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 12:40 pm 6.Michael said …
Richard, I absolutely disagree with you. I see not one hint of sexual tension between the older Illusionist and the girl. She is looking for a protector and he and she take on father/child roles. He buys her only things she requests even when he can’t afford it and finds it difficult (the high heels – that aren’t very high.) He tries often to leave her since he cannot afford to continue taking care of her. But he does NOTHING remotely sexual. Even when he checks in on her (she’s been missing all day) and sees her in bed. The sight of her bare leg forces him to quickly close the door.
Unfortunately, you’ve lost too much of your innocence to accept this film, and I’m sorry for that. The film was written in 1959 and is set in 1959. Times were different. There were bad relationships, of the type you mention, but this is not one of them. Sorry.
The animation is superb, the backgrounds are of a piece and work (except possibly for the cgi turn of the city) and the overall mood is stunningly and wonderfully captured. I loved every minute of the film.
John, I was sure you’d love the film, and I’m sorry we didn’t get a chance to talk about it afterwards. Oh well, there’ll be another time – perhaps tonite.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 1:44 pm 7.Doug said …
Thanks Michael for the review and the discussion. I have been wanting to see this and any talk of it is surely building the suspense.
I fell in love with Chomet’s work via Triplettes – no, the film doesn’t work 100% for me either, but to see such an individual film, with such an original stamp on it – at a time when formula reigns supreme – I couldn’t help but be swept away. I’m hoping for near such an experience with Illusionist.
I would love to see a discussion of ‘pacing’ and attention span in how it relates to animated filmmaking. I don’t know if I’m out-of-step with society but I cannot handle the assault on the senses that is todays animated film. I long for long shots, for no dialog. This is one of the reasons I like Miyazaki (and Chomet) so much. I’ve often wondered if this is the result of cultural difference, or just a more reflective style of director.
Keep up the great blog!
on 11 Nov 2010 at 5:07 pm 8.Eddie Fitzgerald said …
Ergh! I haven’t seen the film yet, but I will, mostly because you recommend it. I have to say that I’m not expecting much, though. The stills look pretty unexciting. They give the impression that the film is rotoscoped, even though there may be no rotoscoping in it.
I love Tati, and I like plenty of live action films that are slow and atmospheric, but I have different expectations from animation. Ours is the medium that can do what live action can’t. Why imitate what live action can do better?
Chomet’s comments in the Guardian contained a lot of truth, but he failed to turn the same critical light on the European model, which he seems to prefer. Current European media is so sedate, so unambitious. It’s hard to believe that continent ever produced flamboyant directors like Sergio Leonne and Fellini. Current European media looks like it was made by latchkey children with limited imaginations.
Well, I’ve been wrong lots of times before, so maybe I’m wrong about this too. I’ll definitely see it when I can.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 6:12 pm 9.Richard O'Connor said …
I should clarify, I don’t find the sexual tension to be a bad thing -in fact, it’s the dramatic highlight of the film.
The fact that it was written 50 years ago does not make more “innocent”. Chaplin, himself, knew all too well about the Mann Act.
Tati brought a je ne sais quois to his films. While this script might have worked for him as an actor/director, to me it doesn’t work well for Chomet. While it speaks to his strengths as an artist -the timing, the pantomime, the attention to detail; it also reinforces his weakness -passive characters and uninspired narrative.
It’s a nice film. Perhaps it would be a great film were it found unearthed from a 1959 time capsule. And, of course, I’d rather see a dozen more pictures like this than another “Toy Story.”
More than a nice film, though, it’s a serious film that merits respect and discussion of its flaws as well as its strengths.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 7:19 pm 10.nick said …
I totally agree with you Michael! So many ppl have made remarks about the relationship of the gentleman to the young girl. I never took it as a sexual one. Seeing how this is a period film the relationship seems to fit perfectly, caring like a father would protect a daughter and care for her.
Maybe its the films we are surrounded by for today’s audiences that have tainted our mindsets.
The film as a whole i throughly enjoyed and felt it was like a glimpse or snapshot into a small part of a character’s life!
on 11 Nov 2010 at 9:12 pm 11.Eddie Fitzgerald said …
Michael, I just reread my earlier comment, and it struck me as being narrow. Of course there’s meritorious work being done in Europe now. I really should be more careful about the way I word things.
on 11 Nov 2010 at 10:57 pm 12.Mark said …
Sorry–but sitting through this film was a chore.
on 12 Nov 2010 at 7:27 am 13.e said …
@ Eddie Fitzgerald:
Whilst you have apologised for your incredibly obtuse comment about European media, the fact you said it at all show how out of touch you are with art, animation, culture. Do you live in Europe, do you see everything made over there? Are you immersed in their culture on a day to day basis? If you were there’s no way you could ever even think those original comments. Are you the stereotpyical Yank who thinks the world begins and ends in America? Do you even realise how the comments you made reinforce the rest of the world’s own stereotyped negative views on Americans being arrogant and culturally ignorant?(which obviously isn’t true) There’s plenty of, in your own words, sedate and unambitious ‘media’ made in America as well – or is everything made across the pond blindingly brilliant?! Per-lease.
Again, in your own words:
Ergh!
Sorry to go off topic. Great post Michael!
on 12 Nov 2010 at 7:53 am 14.Teodor said …
maybe they do not like it because there are no CalArts jumpings?
on 12 Nov 2010 at 3:33 pm 15.Eddie Fitzgerald said …
Reply to “.e”: By definition almost every generalization is flawed or incomplete. We generalize anyway, because if we didn’t every conversation would sound like a legal document.
on 14 Nov 2010 at 3:24 pm 16.sean wickett said …
great review michael.
i saw this at the ottawa animation festival. in fact, it was the motivation for me to attend this year. i thought it was amazing. unfortunately, i didn’t make it in time to see it on it’s final screening.
while watching, i mentally paused at parts in the film that i knew would cause criticism within the community. the leisurely pace, for sure, the situation with the magician and his charge, the bittersweet ending, the characters not ‘redeeming’ themselves…
it concerns me that our culture holds its artistic works as the epitome of all art in its respective field (generalization, i know). mostly because it has the best production value, or the biggest budgets, or has the best box office. it’s unfortunate that a 30 year old, today, would have a difficult time sitting through Mon Oncle or something similar, and therefore call it dull, or not worthy of further attention.
i think the illusionist is a prime example of this. the irony, of course, is the magician’s profession becoming extinct as much as the medium and form in which his story is told.
i agree with eddie about animation’s ability to show us things that are impossible to do in live action. again, i think chomet’s film is a perfect representation of that philosophy.
on 15 Nov 2010 at 11:18 am 17.Eddie Sotto said …
While it is true that Hollywood has a creative deficit to rival the Federal one, I think it’s unfair to lump Pixar wholesale into the “slam bang” pacing critique when they have also made films like WALL-E where you have a first half that is poetic and virtually free of dialog, or a slower moving film like UP!. They do mainstream fare and also expand the medium.
on 15 Nov 2010 at 11:21 am 18.Michael said …
I don’t see UP as slower paced in any way whatsoever. All that racing around the airplanes at the end just made it like any other run-of-the-mill animated film. The same is true for the last half of WALL-E.
on 17 Nov 2010 at 12:25 am 19.Robert Jersak said …
I couldn’t agree more about Pixar, Michael. I feel as though their films have become rushed storyboard pitches with scenes of forced “heart” stitched in. I’ve lost interest in their work, and with a tiring formula and three sequels out of their latest four films, I guess they’ve lost interest in new directions.
I can’t wait to see The Illusionist, and I appreciate your thoughtful and collaborative review. Someday, God willing, I’ll have the pleasure of seeing and discussing one of these films with you in person.