November 27, 2003

• Triplettes de Belleville

  

  This film gets OUR vote for the Oscars! Actually we don’t understand how you can pit this masterpiece against ‘Finding Nemo’ (another animated masterpiece, true.) Both films are technically brilliant but they each come from completely different worlds and have completely opposite objectives.

  In the aesthetically-inspiring Triplettes de Belleville, this is where Animation really feels like an ART form. There is no dialogue; each character has an eye-catching (highly caricaturized) design and unique style of movement; the BGs are incredibly detailed and magnificent; CGI objects and vehicles work beautifully (seamlessly) with the hand-drawn animation; the music is awesome AND it’s refreshing to see a film that is so European in its sensibility – something that you know could NEVER EVER successfully be pitched or made in a country like the USA, the place that most of us acknowledge as the global hub of animation. You really feel like you’ve been transported to another world…

  In fact, as inspiring as this film was (I want to pick up a pencil again! I want to draw better! I want to animate!) it also left me feeling sad. I am reminded of how creatively restricted we are, working in this industry.

  Can you imagine trying to pitch the Triplettes de Belleville feature premise in Hollywood? No wisecrackin’ sidekicks, no spunky male leads, no celebrity voices. (No animated Sinbads with lines like ” Pretty cool, huh?”) How would you make a distinctly individualistic animated film in the USA, with extreme caricatures of different nationalities? There’s just no way…

  Imagine the response from execs: “The heroes are three OLD WOMEN?? What do you mean the male lead doesn’t speak? We’ve lost our Boys 6-11 demographic there…”

  As the director, Sylvain Chomet says (from the AWN interview):

  I’m very involved with the whole “line test” thing. For me, when you’ve worked all day on an animation and that moment when you see the drawings move, that’s a really magic moment, and there is no sound to it. I also think that an animation without the constraints of spoken words is stronger. If you have to fit everything to the words, all the gestural movement revolves around the mouth. Without it, you are much freer to create true animation, to talk through animation itself.

  Favourite characters: The waiter, and Bruno the fat dog who barks at trains.

   

   More–>  Gallery of Stills

  Links:

  An Interview with the Filmmakers - the writer/director, 3D supervisor, composer, & production designer.

  Les Triplettes de Belleville – by Sylvain Chomet (official French website)- synopsis and trailers

  BBC UK- Interview with the director

  Animation Nation discussion thread (mixed reviews) 

  I think you can buy it on DVD here

  • 9:44 pm
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