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MOVIES

French Oscar nominee offers a 'Triplet' treat

Film draws a picture of what non-Disney animation can be

By DUANE DUDEK Journal Sentinel film critic

Friday, February 6, 2004

"The Triplets of Belleville" balances lack of coordination and ungainliness on its nose like a seal.

This nearly wordless, Oscar-nominated French animated feature is a triumph of physical determination and emotional imagination, in style and execution, while managing to look otherwise.

Someone embarrassed by a pratfall may claim he "meant to do that," but Sylvain Chomet, the comic-book artist turned director of "The Triplets of Belleville" actually does "do that": He makes art out of things a tradition- and demographic-bound Disney tends to reject.

"Belleville" -- the story of a clubfooted fireplug of a grandmother and the orphaned grandson she transforms into a bicycle- riding champion -- has the jabberwocky aesthetic of "Monty Python" illustrator Terry Gilliam and the Rube Goldberg lyricism of Jean- Pierre Jeunet's "The City of Lost Children" and "Amelie."

It tells a more or less linear tale with the angular energy of a ping-pong ball, bouncing off obtuse sources of inspiration. Its combination of traditional and digital techniques is like making an MP3 file resemble a 78-rpm recording.

"Belleville" is the sum total of the edges and corners that Disney -- a fellow animated-feature Oscar nominee for "Brother Bear" and, with Pixar, "Finding Nemo" -- rounds off so that no one puts an eye out with the spinoff merchandise. Neither the egg-shaped, sad-eyed orphan of "Belleville" nor the horse-faced, needle-nosed adult he becomes will ever be made into a plush toy.

But sandwiched between those extremes is a richly detailed fable of family, love and loyalty as enchanting as "Finding Nemo." To give the lonely boy companionship and direction, the grandmother offers him a puppy and a tricycle. Years later, their rural idyll gives way to encroaching civilization.

The puppy has grown into an obese dog whose real and dream worlds revolve around barking at the commuter trains whose tracks rock the family home off its foundation. The boy has become a champion cyclist and the grandmother is his coach, massaging his calves with an egg beater.

When he disappears during the Tour de France -- shown as commercially cluttered as the Super Bowl -- the grandmother and the dog embark on a transcontinental search with help from triplets, once a popular cabaret act glimpsed at the start of the film. (Their syncopated theme song is also nominated for an Oscar.) Their inquiry pits them against a Mafioso who is nestled between two square- shouldered, chain-smoking bodyguards, like the marshmallow in a s'more.

Sight gags circle, recur and ricochet off this scenario as if imagined by Buster Keaton, and the perspectives -- a black-and-white photo becomes a TV image, then a family watching TV, then us watching the family as the main characters race by -- percolate with invention.

"Belleville," like Japanese anime, is a reminder that Disney is the exception, not the rule. In much of the world, animation is a complex and layered conversation between filmmakers and an adult audience, rather than a platform for juvenilia. "Belleville" is a comfortably subversive and accomplished film that speaks to everyone, without talking down to anyone.

-- -- --

The animated short "Destino" is a collaboration between surrealist Salvador Dali and pragmatist Walt Disney, recently completed by French animator Dominique Monfery.

Dali and Disney were mutual admirers, and in 1946 Dali briefly worked on a film inspired by a Spanish love song. Disney archivist Dave Smith speculates that the project was sidelined because Walt couldn't figure out how to fit it into his commercial repertoire.

Monfery worked from Dali's storyboards and with help from John Hench, the now 95-year-old animator who worked with Dali. The result is a Dali-esque dreamscape -- an army of bicycle-riding Sigmund Freuds wears loaves of bread on their heads -- filtered through the functional Disney dream factory.

It is a tantalizing glimpse at a road hinted at by "Fantasia" but finally not taken.

"Destino" is playing only at the Oriental Theatre, 2230 N. Farwell Ave. E-mail Duane Dudek at ddudek@journalsentinel.com.

The Triplets of Belleville ****

Behind the scenes: Produced by Didier Brunner and Paul Cadieux. Written and directed by Sylvain Chomet. Rated: PG-13; cartoon gunplay Approximate running time: 80 minutes

Destino *** 1/2

Behind the scenes: Produced by Baker Bloodworth. Story by Salvador Dali and John Hench. Directed by Dominique Monfery. Not rated: fleeting nudity Approximate running time: 7 minutes

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