Belleville Rendez-vous, known as The Triplets of Belleville outside of my
native United Kingdom,
is a 2003 Oscar nominated animated feature, written and directed by the
mastermind behind the similarly styled 2010 Oscar nominated The Illusionist. The film tells the
surrealist story of a doting grandma who trains her grandson to compete in the
Tour de France before he is kidnapped by the mob. Determined to return him to
his native France, she
tracks him to Belleville (modelled on New York City) where she
and her obese dog befriend the Belleville Triplets, a formerly popular music
hall act.
As well as reminding me of
director Sylvain Chomet’s quite and masterful feature, The Illusionist, the animation is also reminiscent of classic Disney.
The still backdrops and wildly grotesque characters remain faithful to the
animation found in the likes of Dumbo
or Pinocchio but are darker and drawn
with the animator’s tongue firmly in cheek. The animation also displays modern
touches but these are counteracted by the wonderfully realised mid twentieth
century setting. There are even flairs of psychedelia present and side
characters such as an overly foppish waiter and henchmen who seem conjoined at
their ridiculously overgrown shoulders wouldn’t look out of place in a dehydrated Yellow Submarine. The surrealist nature of the animation also
extends beyond the character and occasionally creeps into inanimate objects too
where it is befitting of the plot.
