疯狂约会美丽都 Les triplettes de Belleville, also known as The Triplets of Belleville. Watched it today.
The first 5 minutes made me decide this was a unique and great piece of animation. So I paused it, hurriedly ate my meal, very reverently closed all my other programs, and gave Les triplettes de Belleville my undivided attention.
For an animated film running a bit over 80 minutes, the plot unfolded quite differently from what I’d expected after those first 5 minutes. I’d assumed it was the moving story of a tough, capable grandmother raising a world-class athlete, but it turned out to be nothing of the sort (thankfully — if it had gone the way I imagined, it would have been a cliché). Later on, the grandson not only fails to achieve any great success, he gets abducted by gangsters, which left me feeling a bit regretful. Still, the grandmother’s cleverness, her being impervious to both blade and bullet, and her showing off her skills really left me gaping.
Although there’s hardly a line of dialogue from beginning to end, the visuals already tell the story smoothly and completely, and the characters are drawn well enough. The power of the imagery is flawless.
The innuendo and black humor reflect the dark corners behind the glitz and glamour of the beautiful city. The warm color palette and exaggerated visuals fill that gray city with comedic color once more.
The ending is very subtle. I caught a glimpse of the photo on the wall, heard the final line of dialogue come out of the grandson’s mouth, and the tears just came pouring down. The original question is still there, still as kind and gentle as ever, but once the answer is spoken aloud, the listener who loved him most departed long ago.
Springs go, autumns come; things are the same, but the people are not. The rivers and mountains remain as they were; how many times has the setting sun glowed red?
This film is from 2003, and it has a very high rating on Douban — it really is well worth watching. I don’t have enough command of language to write a proper review of it; I’m just jotting this down: today, this animated film moved me.