The Triplets of Belleville (2003)

Let me say, right off the bat, that as a general rule I greatly dislike animated films, especially those of the Disney variety. That being said, however, every once and a while an animated film comes along and just knocks my socks off. Sylvain Chomet's The Triplets of Belleville is just such a film. It is so unlike anything that has been produced in this country for that last 30 or 40 years, and it puts the saccharin-soaked Disney stuff to shame. The film is not only entertaining, not only funny, it's also a visual feast. Every scene is packed so full of detail that it's tempting to stop the DVD so that you can take it all in. But don't do that. Let it run, and enjoy the ride. And I know that some people will be put off by the fact that this is another of those foreign films that you have to read. Not so. There is virtually no dialogue in the film. In fact, The Triplets of Belleville is just about the closest thing to a silent movie that has come out since Mel Brooks' Silent Movie. There's no language barrier to cross watching this movie; although, there are some cultural barriers. A lot of the characters that show up in the film are actually caricatures of real French people. But whether you know who they are or not, the movie is still great fun to watch.

The Triplets of Belleville tells the story of Madame Souza, who finds herself taking care of her grandson Champion. We're never told why or how she ended up with custody of Champion. She just has him. They live in a tall house far out in the French country side. Champion is a sad little boy. Madame Souza tries various ways of cheering him up. She even buys him a puppy, but soon the novelty wears off. Then Madame Souza discovers that Champion longs to race a bike in the Tour de France. She runs out and buys her little ward a tricycle, and he's in heaven. Fast forward many years. The city has encroached on the tiny house nearly knocking it over. The puppy - Bruno - has grown big and fat and lazy. And Champion is now a young man who spends all of his time training for the Tour de France, and Madame Souza is his coach and number one fan. As he peddles up and down the streets of their home town, she peddles along behind him on the old tricycle, panting out a beat through a whistle. After the ride, she massages his muscles, tunes his bike, and feeds him nutritious - albeit unappetizing - meals.

Finally, the day of the big race arrives. Champion pants his way through the Tour de France with all of the other athletes as crowds of fans line the raceway, cheering on the riders. Madame Souza and Bruno follow along behind Champion in their van ready to offer assistance when necessary. Suddenly, The Square Shoulder Men show up and disable the support van. While Madame Souza and her driver try to get the van back in the race, The Square Shoulder Men kidnap Champion and two other riders. They drive their hostages to Marseille, where they embark on a ship. Madame Souza and Bruno, arrive just as the chip is disappearing. The ever-resourceful old lady rents one of those little peddle-powered paddle boats and she and Bruno set out after the ship. Sometime later they arrive in the city of Belleville, looking an awful lot like New York City, complete with a bloated statue of liberty. Madame Souza and Bruno are befriended and taken in by three old ladies, The Triplets of Belleville, who used to have a jazz act that they performed many years ago. Their glory days gone, they live now in a run-down flat, surviving on frogs that they catch from a local swamp, and performing in a local restaurant. Madame Souza joins them in their act and bides her time. Meanwhile, The Square Shoulder Men have pressed Champion and his fellow cyclists into slavery, forcing them to peddle stationary bikes that control the movements of toy bikes on a miniature track. Mafia men from all over Belleville come to place bets on whose toy bicycle will reach the finish line first. But Madame Souza soon finds Champion, storms the Mafia hideout, and escapes with her grandson. All ends happily.

Okay, I know that doesn't sound very interesting when you write it out that way. But this film has got to be seen, has got to be experienced, in order to fully appreciate its charm and beauty. Note how everything in the background is tall and thin - buildings, bridges, boats. Note the cheering fans along the raceway - how well even these periphery characters are drawn. Note the fawning French waiters who look like they have no spines. Note how droll almost all of the characters are. Note the incredible detail that went into drawing every single scene. And this isn't a computer animation. This is animation done the old-fashioned way, by hand, with pen and ink and wash. And it shows in every frame. I love this movie. It is the antithesis of every thing that is cranked out by Disney and Pixar et al. The Triplets of Belleville is an animated film that doesn't insult your intelligence, that doesn't send you into a diabetic coma, that's truly enjoyable to watch.

The Triplets of Belleville is rated PG-13 (lots of shooting and killing during the final chase seen) and has a runtime of about 78 minutes.

The City of Lost Children (1995)

One (Ron Perlman) is a Russian whale hunter. Well, used to be. He can't do it anymore. Now he performs as a circus strong man. Breaks chains. That sort of thing. Denree (Joseph Luien) is his adopted little brother. All he does is eat. One night, someone stabs their manager. As they watch over their wounded friend, a group of strange men, each with one mechanical eye, attack them and steal Denree. One sets out in search of him through the twisting streets and alleyways of Marc Callo's and Jean-Pierre Jeunet's The City of Lost Children. Along the way, One meets Miette (Judith Vittet), a young orphan girl who agrees to help One finds his little brother. But their quest is not an easy one. There is danger everywhere. They are chased by the governess of the orphanage where Miette used to live, the evil Siamese twins, la Pieuvre (Genvieve Brunet and Odile Mallet) who use their wards to steal for them. They employ Marcello (Jean-Claude Dreyfus) who uses a trained flea and a secret serum to drive people into homicidal rages. The flea triggers one of the most wonderful chain-of-event sequences that I have ever seen in any movie. It's right out of a Warner Brothers cartoon. Anyway, One and Miette discover that Danree has been kidnapped by a secret group called the Cyclopes, blind men who have mechanical eyes installed in their heads. They kidnap children for the mysterious Krank (Daniel Amilfork), who can no longer dream, and so he exists on the dreams of children. One and Miette invade Krank's lair on an abandoned oil rig, rescue Danree and all of the other children, and leave as the rig is demolished by Krank's half-crazed father.

Okay, I'm gonna warn you right now. The City of Lost Children is not to everyone's taste. It's a quirky film whose plot mirrors the labyrinthine streets of the city in which it is set. But I love this movie. It's a visual feast, full of color, shadows, and textures. The sets are unbelievable. They're almost like a cartoon of reality, yet they're real sets, not computer animated fabrications, like in Sky Captain. Every scene is packed with crumbling brick and weathered wood, rain-slick cobble stones, rusted steel. It begs to be touched. You feel this movie more than watch it. You watch it more than listen to it. You listen because you cannot help yourself. The haunting musical score pulls you into this 1930s French port city, and you go along following the clues that will lead One and Miette back to Danree. I also love the relationship that forms between One and Miette, as he grows to care for this little girl who's on the cusp of adolescence. He carries her around when her shoes wear out, massages her feet when they get sore, warms her up when she gets cold. Don't go thinking bad thoughts now. It's all innocent. One may be over six feet tall and strong as an ox, but mentally he's a child himself. Miette takes care of him, just as much as he takes care of her. In the end, you know that One, Miette and Denree will be a happy family.

The City of Lost Children is rated R, and this gives me a great opportunity to rant and rave about the rating system in this country. There is absolutely no reason to give this film an R rating. There is no sex, and the only profanity used in the film is a word that every child over the age of ten has heard many times over. Yes, there is violence and some disturbing imagery, but it's far less than appeared in the PG-13 rated Lord of the Rings movies. My personal opinion is that the R rating was punitive, meant to reduce the number of teenagers who might otherwise have seen and enjoyed this exquisite French movie. Why this should be, I do not know. I only know that the R rating is completely undeserved.

I've Loved You So Long (2008)

Many movies deal with finding, arresting, trying and imprisoning murderers. Few movies deal with what happens to them when they get out of prison. Philippe Claudel's I've Loved You So Long does just that. It picks up where the other movies leave off, when the offender is released. Kristen Scott Thomas portrays Juliette, a woman who has been in prison for the last fifteen years. Now she's being released. Her younger sister Lea (Elsa Zylberstein) picks her up at the prison and drives Juliette back to her house. Juliette doesn't seem overjoyed at the prospect, but she has no where else to go. Lea is nervous and vainly tries to make small talk. It's awkward. Lea lives with her husband, Luc (Serge Hazanavicius), her two adopted Vietnamese daughters, and Luc's father, Pappy Paul (Jean-Claude Arnaud). Luc is uneasy about having Juliette in their house. Pappy Paul doesn't speak anymore, but he seems to understand what's going on around him.

Juliette has committed an unpardonable crime. Even though she's served her time in prison, her sentence isn't over. Everybody knows what she did, and few are willing to forget it, or let her forget either. The only one who really seems to understand is her parole officer. The rest are a mixed bag. Some try to understand, but don't. Some don't even try. Lea wants to understand, but Juliette is loathe to explain. She had very good reasons for doing what she did, but they're hard to reveal. They talk around her crime, never quite about it. Slowly, cautiously, Juliette unfolds. It's not easy. Fifteen years in prison have taught her to keep her guard up. Now everyone expects her to drop it. But how do you break a fifteen-year-old habit? Eventually the truth will come out, but it's painful, arduous, like an extended labor that gives birth a new life. In this case, the new life is Juliette's. Yet she carries with her the memory of the life she took. That burden will always be with her. But in the end, we're left feeling that she'll be all right carrying it. Especially since she's letting Lea help her.

I've Loved You So Long is a touching, heartbreaking movie. Like many French films, it doesn't follow the conventions of American cinema. This is a gentle film about the consequences of a violent act on the lives of the people involved. Just when you are expecting the loud scene that would occur in a stateside production, the film goes off down a quieter path. When the secrets are all revealed, there is forgiveness, which can sometimes be harder to deal with than blame. As the haunted Juliette suddenly thrown back into the world of the living, Kristen Scott-Thomas seems almost brittle. You think she will shatter at any moment. Don't worry though. She won't.

I've Loved You So Long is rated PG-13 and is available either in French with English sub-titles or dubbed into English.

My Best Friend (2006)

Patrice Leconte's My Best Friend is a heart-warming movie starring Daniel Auteuil as Francois, an obnoxious art dealer who is denounced at a party by his business partner, Catherine (Julie Gayet). She tells him that she doesn't like him and that he has no true friends, and all of the other people at the party back her up. When he insists that he does indeed have a best friend, she challenges him to produce his friend. This sends Francois scurrying around Paris in search of someone who likes him. Sadly, he finds not a single soul willing to admit that they are his friend, except for a jovial, trivia spouting cab driver named Bruno (Danny Boon) that he keeps running into. Unbelievably, Bruno genuinely likes Francois, and goes out of his way to help him. Finally, Francois concocts a scheme to get Bruno to steel a priceless vase from his own apartment so that he can collect the insurance. Bruno agrees and sneaks into Francois' apartment, where he finds all of Francois' acquaintances waiting in the dark. Francois turns on the lights and introduces Bruno as such a true friend that he would even be willing to steal for him. When Bruno realizes that Francois was only using him, he smashes the vase and storms out. Francois has lost the bet. Later, Bruno wins a spot on the French version of Who Wants To Be a Millionaire. When a question about art comes up that Bruno doesn't know the answer to, he is faced with a dilemma. Should he guess and risk losing, or should he turn to Francois as his "lifeline"?

Think you know the answer? Don't bet on it. If this was an American movie, I could tell you without even seeing it exactly how the film would end. Bruno would and Francois would make up, Bruno would win millions of dollars, and the two would retire to a tropical island together, surrounded by beautiful women, where they would live happily ever after. But French movies don't follow the same predictable patterns that American films invariably follow, and that's one of the reasons I love watching them. French filmmakers seem to understand that real life seldom has a true happily ever after to it. My Best Friend ends, as most French comedies do, on something of a bittersweet note. But, in my humble opinion, it's a richly satisfying one.

My Best Friend is rated PG-13 and is available in French with English subtitles.

Jean de Florette and Manon of the Spring (1986)

Years ago, when it first came out, I saw Manon of the Spring, and it was a wonderful movie. The only trouble was that I had never seen Jean de Florette. Big mistake. You can't watch the one without seeing the other. Manon of the Spring is not the sequel to Jean de Florette - it's the continuation of it. The two are one long narrative. And while each movie can stand alone, it is only when seen together that you grasp the full impact of the tragedy that unfolds before you.

Warning! Spoiler Alert!

The titular character of Jean de Florette (Gerard Depardieu) is a hunchbacked tax collector who inherits a run down farm in Provence. All of the locals figure he'll sell the farm, but Jean has a dream. He moves there with his wife, Aimee (Elisabeth Depardieu), and his daughter, Manon (Ernestine Mazurowna) to raise rabbits. This doesn't set to well with the local big shot, Cesar Soubeyran (Yves Montand), and his nephew, Ugolin (Daniel Auteuil). They want the land, which is the richest in the province, and the spring that's on it so they can raise flowers. In order to force Jean to sell out cheap, they block up the spring before he arrives, but Jean is determined to see his dream become a reality. When told that the only water is another spring a mile and a half away, Jean goes ahead and builds his rabbit farm. Then he begins the arduous task of hauling water from the distant spring on his mule and on his back. He does this for two years, as his crops and his rabbits die. Then using the farm as collateral, he borrows money from Cesar to dig a well. While dynamiting rock in the well, Jean is critically injured and dies a few days later. Aimee sells the farm to Cesar at a ridiculously low price. As she is preparing to leave, Manon sees Cesar and Ugolin unblocking the spring, releasing the water that would have saved both the farm and Jean.

In Manon of the Spring, we find Manon (Emmanuelle Beart), now grown to a beautiful young woman, herding goats in the hills near Cesar Soubeyran's farm. One day, she discovers the source of the water that feeds not only the spring on her father's old farm, but also Cesar's spring and the town's well. Having finally found a way to take revenge on the people who caused her father's death, she blocks up the spring, cutting off the water supply for the entire valley. Chaos ensues as the farmers and villagers fight over who's going to get what little water there is and who's to blame for the shortage. Meanwhile, Ugolin has become obsessed with Manon, whom he saw skinny dipping in the woods. He swears his undying love for her, even offering to pay her to be his wife, but she hasn't forgotten that he caused her father's death. Besides, she only has eyes for the new young school teacher, Bernard (Hippolyte Girardot). In despair, Ugolin hangs himself, and Manon unplugs the spring, letting the water flow back to the thirsty valley. As she and Bernard wed, Cesar learns that Jean was his own son from a tryst he had as a young man with a woman named Florette before he joined the army.

Jean de Florette and Manon of the Spring are beautifully filmed in the rugged hills of Provence. Director Claude Berri makes us feel the heat of the relentless sun beating down on the arid landscape. I found myself longing for a glass of cold water, as I watched Jean hauling the heavy water cans up and down the steep path to water his thirsty crops and rabbits. In fact, this is a story about thirst - the land's thirst for water, Ceasr's thirst for land that isn't his, Ugolin's thirst for Manon, Jean's thirst for his dream, and Manon's thirst for her father's revenge. In the end, water flows again, in both the literal and the spiritual sense. Before he dies, Cesar wills his entire estate, which includes Jean's farm, to Manon, the last of the Soubeyrans. So the first end up being last, and the meek truly do inherit the earth.

Jean de Florette and Manon of the Spring are both rated PG.