4.5 stars (out of five). Rating: PG, and quite stupidly, because some of these animated characters smoke (!)
By Derrick Bang • Originally published in The Davis Enterprise, 2.11.11
Some transitions are smooth and painless; others are painful and cruel.
French animation maestro Sylvain Chomet’s The Illusionist is a melancholy ode to a passing era: the last final gasps of classic vaudeville. The setting is the late 1950s; the title character, Tatischeff, is a stage magician forced by a changing world – and most visibly by the advent of television and rock ’n’ roll – to accept work in a succession of fading and dilapidated theaters, music halls and even bars, often in fringe villages.
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| Although young Alice would prefer to dine in an upscale restaurant, surrounded by Edinburgh's "beautiful people," Tatischeff lacks the funds for such an excursion. The far more practical alternative: fish and chips, of course. |
Tatischeff is a master of his craft, but this is of no consequence; nobody cares. Theaters laden with enthusiastic teenagers who swoon over the gyrations of a rock quartet suddenly empty when our magician takes the stage, demonstrating his skill to no more than a handful of aging patrons.
Make no mistake: This is a profoundly sad story. It really can’t be otherwise, because it takes place in our real world, albeit a stylized representation that is meticulously – and lovingly – crafted via hand-drawn animation. The Illusionist is beautiful to watch: gorgeous in the manner of old-style ink-and-paint animation practiced only by a precious few these days. Fans of classic animation will swoon over this film the way they embrace every frame of a Hayao Miyazaki fable (Ponyo, Spirited Away
).No surprise, then, that The Illusionist is competing for the 2010 Academy Award for best animated film, against Toy Story 3 and How to Train Your Dragon.
Tatischeff’s first few bookings establish the sad pattern of his life, as he resolutely works his stage miracles to largely indifferent patrons, just to earn enough money to eat, keep a roof over his head, and move on to the next gloomy venue. He eventually winds up at a Scottish tavern and a somewhat more appreciate audience, if only because they’ve been loosened up with liberal quantities of beer.
Here, though, the dynamic changes: He meets Alice, an impressionable teenage girl who works at the tavern. Although a big-city teen probably wouldn’t be so easily impressed, Alice hasn’t yet lost the sense of wonder possessed by all children; perhaps it’s the isolated environment. She believes in Tatischeff; he recognizes and cherishes this. When he “conjures up” a pair of new shoes for the girl, to replace the tattered pair on her feet, her eyes light up: not just at the gift itself, but at the magic by which they appeared.
She elects to leave the tavern when Tatischeff moves on to his next job. Mind you, this is a completely innocent arrangement: a father/daughter relationship, nothing more. They wind up in Edinburgh, where they take a room at the Little Joe Hotel, a boarding house for similarly disenfranchised performers: a sad-faced clown, a too-desperately cheerful ventriloquist, a trio of acrobats. Tatischeff obtains a booking at the nearby Royal Music Hall.
