catapult magazine

This new animated film blew me away. It is 100% brilliant. The fact that a film like this can be made gives me hope for humankind. Anybody seen it?

Did I mention that this is a really really good movie?

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9E04E1DA1F3BF935A15752C1A9659C8B63

You convinced me. I’m gonna go see it.

I saw a trailor for it on the quicktime website. It looked absolutely bizarre. The trailor did not show any plot or character info. The animation did look intersting but I that’s not enough of a reason for me to fork over 8 bucks or even 2 to rent it. What’s it about? Any similarities to other movies?

It’s hard to describe why it’s worth $8. There is virtually no dialogue. Trying to describe the plot would be a waste of time here because there’s nothing to compare it to, and it doesn’t make a lot of sense anyway. Nothing makes sense when I describe it here but everything makes sense in the movie. It’s a world where a vacuum cleaner is a musical instrument, where frogs are popsicles, where a dog can become the replacement for a punctured tire, and where a car crashes and explodes a second later. The film left me baffled as to what just happened, but I want to see it again and again and again. Oh yeah, the soundtrack is stunning.

Oh man, yeah! I saw this in Liverpool when I was there and it rocked. The way I’ve described it is this: it’s like a Shel Silversten book made into a movie for grown-ups. (Shel Silversten being the guy who wrote The Giving Tree and other really cool children’s books. Plus I know he’s done other stuff . . help me out).

My favorite part of this movie was the sound effects. They were fantastic.

It’s also as French as can be. Some things sort of assaulted my American sensibilities, but in a good way. It’s charming like Amelie, not charming like Finding Nemo.

It was called Belleville Rendezvous in some places, I think. Just in case someone’s looking for it and can’t find it under the other name.

Oh, man. I wanted to like it so much, but I just didn’t. It was interesting. The grotesque, bizzare images were captivating, but I left the film feeling very unsatisfied. And I don’t think it’s because I was longing for a happy Disney ending. It just seemed that all the characters were caricatures, and not just the fat Bellevillians. I hated it that we got to see that one brief moment of happiness in the little boy’s eyes when he got his tricycle, and then for the rest of the movie he looks so despairing and completely resigned to everything that happens to him. All the subverbal squawks and screeches from the triplets also irritated me. It all seemed rather joyless.

I feel bad for not liking it. It got rave reviews and 50 million critics can’t be wrong. I think it’s just a taste thing.

I could see how you could dislike this film (though I’m sorry to hear it). The hero of the story is no hero at all. He is a pawn, first in the hands of his grandmother (if that’s what she is), then in the hands of the bad guys who don’t seem to treat him any worse than she did, and finally back in the hands of the good guys. Through it all, he doesn’t change one bit. He’s more of a prop than an actor.

It’s interesting, though, that you say the film is joyless. I laughed a lot while watching it. And there were people around me in the theatre who obviously couldn’t contain themselves at certain points in the movie—I’m talking about hearty belly laughs. Funny thing was that the humour was a bit of an individualistic experience as everyone seemed to find different things funny. There wasn’t much collective laughter. But I loved hearing the eruptions from different parts of the room at seemingly random moments. The film would not have been the same without that.

Anyway, laughter is not the same thing as joy. I wouldn’t describe the film as joyful, but I felt full of joy walking home that night. Perhaps it is a matter of taste like you say. Sure the end of the film didn’t leave me feeling happy for the characters or the outcome of the action, but I revelled in my own confusion about the film, and in the richness of the film’s images for days afterwards.