Invoking the name of Jacques Tati in this era of filmmaking is likely to excite the most hardcore of French cinema fanatics and film students, but for those who haven't experienced the wry pleasures of Tati's brand of thoughtful French comedy--chief among them, the fantastic Monsieur Hulot's Holiday--you may not know quite what to make of The Illusionist.
Granted, you might feel that way even if you're a celebrator of Tati's scant filmography. Adapted from a screenplay written, but never produced by Tati, director Sylvain Chomet has crafted an animated film that feels like Tati's personality painted in broad strokes. This is a long way from the balls-out strangeness of Chomet's last film, the revered Triplets of Belleville, yet it retains a similarly gorgeous impenetrability. By that, I mean to say that The Illusionist is a phenomenal-looking film, and a periodically very funny one. But Chomet's adapted story of an aging magician in a world passing him by is hampered by an increasingly airless relationship between his titular illusionist and a young female companion.
Before we get to that relationship, we meet the illusionist, Tatischeff, as he plays to a near-empty crowd of barely attentive theater-goers in late '50s Edinburgh, Scotland. His life appears a solitary one, even outside of his meagerly-attended performances. His sole companion is a crotchety, overweight rabbit that comes across as though it's been pulled from a few too many hats in its day. Tatischeff seems resigned to his fate as an antiquity of the entertainment world, until a chance meeting with an enthusiastically drunk and wealthy Scotsman has him whisked away to a small village to perform in front of a crowd of his rowdy countrymen.
The whooping, excitable crowd seems to renew Tatischeff's resolve, especially after he befriends a young hotel maid named Alice. Perhaps feeling a mixture of pity and paternal attraction to the girl, Tatischeff offers her a gift of a new pair of shoes. Alice, grateful and fascinated with what she believes to be Tatischeff's "real magic," makes the snap decision to tag along with the illusionist on his subsequent journey back to Edinburgh for a series of performances.
At first the relationship between the two is a cute, if slightly awkward one. Tatischeff agrees to crash on the couch of their humble little hotel room while she takes the bed (as if to make it clear this is not about a romantic attraction, whatsoever), and she takes it upon herself to clean and cook while the old man is out doing his shows. It's at this point that The Illusionist takes a strange turn. The early goings of the film appear to be headed in the direction of showing a once dimming star begin to rejuvenate himself through new friendship and success, but Chomet's script (and perhaps Tati's--we don't know precisely how much Chomet altered the original story, exactly) instead delves into a strange, stuffy sentimentality, mixed with an increasingly uncomfortable dynamic between Tatischeff and Alice.
After the gift of the shoes, Alice begins seeing all manner of fancy coats, dresses and high heels in various storefronts. Tatischeff, perhaps overly eager to keep the girl happy, continuously gives in to her retail-oriented desires, to the point of having to take on odd jobs to support her "habit," so to speak. This goes on for quite some time, until Tatischeff and Alice find themselves in progressively divergent places. I won't say specifically how their relationship comes to a close, except to say that Chomet's harshly sad final thought of the film comes like a poetic hammer to the skull just as the credits are about to roll.
The nature of Tatischeff and Alice's strange relationship makes a certain amount of sense, given that Tati originally wrote the script with one of his daughters in mind--which one, exactly, is a question of some debate, but certain family members believe it to be his eldest, whom he had all but abandoned early in life. The problem is that the nature of that relationship as portrayed in the film is simply stilted and irritating. Alice's big city dreams feel deeply superficial, and Tatischeff becomes less a character of interest, and more one of quiet pity as the film rolls along.
It's a shame, because other elements of The Illusionist's story work extremely well. When he's dealing in elegy to the dying arts of the film's era, Chomet gives us both the film's saddest and funniest moments. The hotel Tatischeff and Alice occupy in Edinburgh is chock full of crazy performance artists, from a trio of acrobatic brothers (who let out little "Hup! Hup! Hup!" sounds as they bound around the architecture) to an alcoholic ventriloquist who is infinitely more charming than nearly any other character in the movie. Chomet even somehow manages to make a scene with a suicidal hobo clown remarkably touching.
Maybe it's because Chomet seems more at home working with oddball characters than traditional ones. He certainly gives them a great deal more visual personality than others in the film, playing with proportions and costuming in ways he seems hesitant to do with his principals. In fact, Tatischeff could easily be mistaken for Monsieur Hulot, with his stiff posture and affected mannerisms. It's a tribute that certainly makes sense, though at times, the character feels a bit one-note, especially given the near-total lack of dialogue in the film. People speak, but the verbal language is meant more as a punctuation to the gestural language going on throughout the film.
Undoubtedly, The Illusionist is a beautiful film. Chomet and his animators paint Edinburgh with exquisite detail, bringing incredible life to a city one has rarely seen on live-action film, let alone animated. It's just a shame that for all this visual splendor and reverence to forgotten art--a reverence clearly stated even in the decision to make the film in traditional hand-animated form, itself a nearly forgotten art--Chomet is unable to make his central characters and their relationship more captivating to the audience.
Granted, you might feel that way even if you're a celebrator of Tati's scant filmography. Adapted from a screenplay written, but never produced by Tati, director Sylvain Chomet has crafted an animated film that feels like Tati's personality painted in broad strokes. This is a long way from the balls-out strangeness of Chomet's last film, the revered Triplets of Belleville, yet it retains a similarly gorgeous impenetrability. By that, I mean to say that The Illusionist is a phenomenal-looking film, and a periodically very funny one. But Chomet's adapted story of an aging magician in a world passing him by is hampered by an increasingly airless relationship between his titular illusionist and a young female companion.
Before we get to that relationship, we meet the illusionist, Tatischeff, as he plays to a near-empty crowd of barely attentive theater-goers in late '50s Edinburgh, Scotland. His life appears a solitary one, even outside of his meagerly-attended performances. His sole companion is a crotchety, overweight rabbit that comes across as though it's been pulled from a few too many hats in its day. Tatischeff seems resigned to his fate as an antiquity of the entertainment world, until a chance meeting with an enthusiastically drunk and wealthy Scotsman has him whisked away to a small village to perform in front of a crowd of his rowdy countrymen.
At first the relationship between the two is a cute, if slightly awkward one. Tatischeff agrees to crash on the couch of their humble little hotel room while she takes the bed (as if to make it clear this is not about a romantic attraction, whatsoever), and she takes it upon herself to clean and cook while the old man is out doing his shows. It's at this point that The Illusionist takes a strange turn. The early goings of the film appear to be headed in the direction of showing a once dimming star begin to rejuvenate himself through new friendship and success, but Chomet's script (and perhaps Tati's--we don't know precisely how much Chomet altered the original story, exactly) instead delves into a strange, stuffy sentimentality, mixed with an increasingly uncomfortable dynamic between Tatischeff and Alice.
After the gift of the shoes, Alice begins seeing all manner of fancy coats, dresses and high heels in various storefronts. Tatischeff, perhaps overly eager to keep the girl happy, continuously gives in to her retail-oriented desires, to the point of having to take on odd jobs to support her "habit," so to speak. This goes on for quite some time, until Tatischeff and Alice find themselves in progressively divergent places. I won't say specifically how their relationship comes to a close, except to say that Chomet's harshly sad final thought of the film comes like a poetic hammer to the skull just as the credits are about to roll.
It's a shame, because other elements of The Illusionist's story work extremely well. When he's dealing in elegy to the dying arts of the film's era, Chomet gives us both the film's saddest and funniest moments. The hotel Tatischeff and Alice occupy in Edinburgh is chock full of crazy performance artists, from a trio of acrobatic brothers (who let out little "Hup! Hup! Hup!" sounds as they bound around the architecture) to an alcoholic ventriloquist who is infinitely more charming than nearly any other character in the movie. Chomet even somehow manages to make a scene with a suicidal hobo clown remarkably touching.
Undoubtedly, The Illusionist is a beautiful film. Chomet and his animators paint Edinburgh with exquisite detail, bringing incredible life to a city one has rarely seen on live-action film, let alone animated. It's just a shame that for all this visual splendor and reverence to forgotten art--a reverence clearly stated even in the decision to make the film in traditional hand-animated form, itself a nearly forgotten art--Chomet is unable to make his central characters and their relationship more captivating to the audience.
