This extended review of The Illusionist (released this week on video) is in honor of a local connection: the film's animation director and assistant director, Paul Dutton, comes from Yorkton.
The Illusionist (DVD/Blu-Ray) - Dir. Sylvain Chomet. Starring Jean-Claude Donda, Eilidh Rankin, Duncan MacNeil.
International art house animated production that overflows with style and class.
In the late 1950s, a stage magician named Tatischeff plies his already-antiquated trade at increasingly deserted venues. His ongoing search for audiences still impressed by his art takes him to Scotland, where he meets Alice, a young woman convinced that his magic is real.
Originally written in 1956 by French mime Jaques Tati, the story is told with almost no dialogue, and the few words used are a blend of English, French, Gaelic, and gibberish that no viewers are likely to understand entirely. The plot instead depends upon physical comedy set pieces strung together like a series of the animated shorts that used to fill unsold ad space on television.
But The Illusionist is unmistakable as something greater than that: first for the coherence of its overall vision, and second for the extraordinary artistry that went into its production. The film is perhaps the most successful blend of traditional and modern animation techniques I've ever seen. It's a moving watercolor painting further brought to life by vibrant sound and music.
The fairy-tale-simplicity of The Illusionist's characters could be seen as a weakness. Alice is so sheltered and naïve that the possibility that she is mentally handicapped is bound to cross the viewer's mind.
She's not, of course; she's just the archetype of a playful, innocent girl that the story needs to unfold. And while any substantial change in the characters by the end is hard to spot, it's there if one looks closely enough: revealed in hints at their starting down paths that we never see them finish.
Although the film's subject matter is appropriate for all ages, children will likely find it boring. The understated notes of the main characters' relationship and the mysterious driving force behind the magician are strictly adult fare, and children will miss-or be spared-the melancholic tone that dominates the film.
The Illusionist is about disillusionment: something that becomes truly apparent only in the film's final minutes. The somber images scattered throughout the story-a suicidal clown, a homeless ventriloquist and his crippled dog-that at first seemed to be simply morbid gags now reveal themselves to be something more substantive, something closer to the film's true heart.
The Illusionist poses the question of whether it's better to live in a blissful dream world or to face harsh reality, and it refuses to let us sit out the debate. Alice's dependence on Tatischeff as a magical benefactor is a fantasy that can't last in the real world, and reality is what the film gives us in the end-whether we want it or not.
Audiences used to Hollywood storytelling will likely be surprised to see the credits roll as they wait for that one final scene that provides the customary ray of hope. It never comes.
Or maybe it does, buried somewhere a little more deeply than we expect to find it, in the first steps toward inevitable change-in the proof that life goes on even as the lights go out.
Don't ask me. I just liked the pretty colors.
Rated PG pour le lapin monstrueux.
4 out of 5
