Belleville Rendez-Vouz (2003) Premise Film Review

Fig 1. Movie Poster.

Belleville Rendez-vous also known as The Triplets of Belleville is a silent comedy with a strange and confusing premise, there’s a crime plot set in a super French, exaggerated version of Paris - a neighbourhood called Belleville. The film starts with the triplets when they were young performing in a club in rubber hose animation (see fig 2) which transitions to them on a tv in a new style of animation where we meet the main characters, Madame Souza, her grandson Champion and his dog Bruno. French culture and stereotypes is the main core theme no matter what part of the film you remember or what parts you cut out, there will always be something strongly French. France is well known for cycling, the Tour De France race. Champion grows up to be a professional cyclist and is taken when he gets too exhausted on the track alongside two others and shipped across the ocean to Belleville where they are used for illegal gambling entertainment, Madame Souza follows the ship with him on across the ocean to Belleville with Bruno on a pedal boat, with no money and on the streets the now elder triplets find Souza and take her in and with their help, rescue Champion. This film isn’t challenging, although crime is another core theme there is also the theme of caper - singing, dancing, playfulness throughout and the characters have their own quirky unique charms.

Fig 2. Triplets of Belleville

Belleville Rendez-vouz is hand drawn animation - Chomet’s favourite medium. This choice had a good impact on the narrative, the characters that are drawn are all unique as the director has a love for caricature and how far a design can be pushed, most characters are individual. Using hand drawn animation gives you more freedom to switch styles like the beginning of the film does, it starts with rubber hose animation like the very first Disney shorts did to present footage of the triplets when they were young before zooming out of the tv to the film’s present day in a different (and well matched) style - he’s using animation history to tell history basically. He chose to make this film a silent one so that he could push character design and visual storytelling to its full capacity which is essential to silent films and has an impressive result. In an interview with Animation World Network Chomet explains his logic:

“Im very involved with the whole line test thing. For me, when you've worked all day on an animation and that moment when you see the drawings move, thats really a magical moment, and there is no sound to it. I also think that an animation without the constraints of spoken words is stronger. If you have to fit everything to the words, all the gestural movement revolves around the mouth. Without it, you are much free to create true animation, to talk through animation itself. Animation modelled around the dialogue is like something, which has already been set in stone, theres less scope for interpretation.” (Chomet, 2003)

Fig 3. Family Portrait.

The way he transitions from scenes supports his theme of being strange and bizarre, he’ll morph a face into a hamburger or the bottom of a saucepan full of tadpoles to the moon. The way he does quirky movement supports his narrative such as how vehicles and cyclists move, how the waiter flops about, how the triplets shuffle across the floor, Madame Souza’s determined steps, the square men in black suits moving up and down shimmying with their steps - even movement has its own traits which adds to the creation/reflection of a character in addition to its design.

Fig 4. Floppy Waiter and Men in Suits.

Bibliography:

Chomet, S. and Moins, P. (2003). Sylvain Chomet’s 'The Triplets of Belleville'. [online] Animation World Network. Available at: https://www.awn.com/animationworld/sylvain-chomet-s-triplets-belleville [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].

IMDb. (n.d.). Les triplettes de Belleville Awards. [online] Available at: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0286244/awards [Accessed 10 Feb. 2018].

Illustration List:

Figure 1. Belleville Rendez-vouz Movie Poster (2003) [Poster] At: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/152700243595455979/

Figure 2. Triplets of Belleville (2003) At: https://randomdescent.wordpress.com/2015/01/29/adventures-with-netflix-the-triplets-of-belleville/ 

Figure 3. Family Portrait (2003) At: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/440508407292806091/

Figure 4. Floppy Waiter and Men in Suits (2003) At: https://imgur.com/gallery/qUvBDoc