Brave – plus La Luna

Brave doesn’t deserve the harsh appraisals I read before going to see it. It may not have the biggest emotional impacts of all Pixar’s films, but it tells its simple, old-fashioned story well, it looks striking and it does have a good pay-off. It’s not the best Pixar film ever, but it’s far from the worst – I’d rate it with The Incredibles, Monsters, Inc. and Finding Nemo – better than Ratatouille, A Bug’s Life and the Cars films. Which is a long way from the suggestion that this is part of Pixar’s big downfall – and Cars 2 really wasn’t as bad as is being made out.

Before I say any more about the main feature, though, something must be said about the short film preceding it in the usual Pixar fashion – usually something entertaining but throwaway like the magic show of Presto (with Wall-E) or the silly but somewhat iconic For the Birds (with Monsters, Inc.). This time it was La Luna, and I’m not exaggerating when I say it is absolutely my favourite thing that Pixar have ever done. Yes, over and above all the Toy Story films, above the superb opening of Up, above anything in Brave. I really, really liked it. I liked the simple but highly inventive imagery, the funny characters with what I now realise is a real rarity in Pixar – an incredibly cute child character – and I loved the workers in their olden-days costumes with their generalised European-ish voices. It fully deserved its Oscar nomination last year, and I could have very happily watched a whole feature-length film version..or just the short over and over for the length of Brave. I quite earnestly liked it that much. Enrico Casarosa, you make me more optimistic about The Good Dinosaur.

Anyway, in the wake of Cars 2 has come Brave, one of the few Pixar films – alongside Brad Bird’s films and Up – to have a predominantly human cast. The next Pixar release was to be Newt, but it got scrapped for similarities to Rio. Pixar’s films have a history of coming out coincidentally very close to films that are similar – Antz and A Bug’s Life caused a lot of tension and Dreamworks rushed their film out first, Finding Nemo was quickly followed by Shark Tale and Flushed Away ended up changing its title from Ratopolis to avoid confusion with Ratatouille, despite coming out six months earlier. So it’s understandable that they’d want to avoid yet another clash – and Brave sounds better anyway.

The story of the strong-willed tomboy princess of a vaguely feudal Scottish clan refusing to conform to expectations, causing a rift with her family that reaches a peak with a magical spell, which happily hadn’t been spoiled for me going into the film, despite having at some point long ago heard its working title. It’s a great way of both having a typical Pixar emotional arc and also seeming like a classic story from the period. Though Princess Merida is a good, strong protagonist whose hair makes her instantly recognisable and whose laughter is infectious, probably the main problem with the film is that this just makes her a bit bland. She learns to value those around her, which we’ve seen as the lesson learned too many times before, and it just never feels like she will be in any real danger, or won’t get what she’s hoping for – until the magical contrivance, which really makes the film in every other way, there’s never any real crisis for her, so when it comes it feels just a little artificial – which is enough to tip the balance of the film away from perfection.

The film also just doesn’t look quite as nice as Pixar’s films can. This is not because the backgrounds and textures are anything less than the very cutting edge – but that’s the least we expect from Pixar. The trouble is the character designs just look a bit…well, Dreamworks. And I never really warmed to them, as I did the Incredibles. Pixar is so good at making you care for funny toys, insects, strange little robots…but don’t quite pull it off with stroppy teenagers.

There’s also a little too much plot contrivance. The will-o’-the-wisps weren’t really needed in their first and last appearances, but in the middle one pushed the plot on in a very artificial way. The rival clans are placated a little too easily. And ultimately, it seems like the whole thing could have been resolved with a good sit down and a talk – but then, that’s rather the lesson to be learned by the two stubborn main characters.

With great voice acting, a strong cultural idea of Scotland and lovely modern music with a thin flavouring of traditional Scottish instrumentation, there’s much to admire about this film. It has a brilliant study of animal movement, and a lot of big laughs. It lacks a little spark, true, but that doesn’t stop it being an outstanding film…

Brave post-Oscars note: I have to say I don’t think this deserved its win over any of its competitors – but arguably it is the most Academy-friendly of the films. Wreck-it Ralph is too lowbrow for their pretensions, Frankenweenie and Pirates! too quirky and knowing, and Paranorman too lacking in feel-good schmaltz. Not a deserving winner, but an unsurprising one. 

L’illusionniste / The Illusionist

Not to be confused with The Illusionist, the 2006 film with Edward Norton and Paul Giamatti, itself easy to confuse with 2005’s The Prestige. All centre on stage magicians and prestidigitation, but L’illusionniste is very different, no thriller or murder mystery, but a small-scale drama from the director of Les Triplettes de Belleville, Stephen Chomet.

The story of the script is quite interesting, written by renowned mime Jacques Tati in 1956 but never produced. The animated illusionist is clearly a depiction of Tati himself, with a section in a cinema added to the film just to drive this point home, so this is something like a new Tati film. It’s also worth knowing that the dynamic of the characters is intended to mirror the fondness of father for daughter, because without knowing this beforehand, it is very hard not to see the film in a very different way – and besides, the matter is complicated by the fact that the daughter in question was abandoned by Tati as an infant…although even the matter of which of two estranged daughters the script was inspired by is in dispute. Indeed, central to the problem of this film is that it often doesn’t make its concepts clear enough.

Les Triplettes de Belleville was of course in many ways a tribute to Tati and his Hulot character, but L’illusionniste is altogether more melancholy and realistic than Chomet’s previous film. With stage magicians losing the attention of their audiences, the central character decides to leave France for England (it was Czechoslovakia in the Tati script). Having no luck in London, he goes to perform in Scotland, and there makes friends with an impressionable young woman who marvels at his talents. He buys her a train fare to Edinburgh, then pays for her board and lodging, and lavishes gifts upon her, struggling hard and working several jobs for the money. She, meanwhile, does nothing but keep house and do some cooking, not only for him but other down-and-out performers in the lodging house.

In the end, she finds a dashing man and the illusionist leaves her behind to find a new way to live, all but penniless and alone. If you see the story from his point of view, it’s a bittersweet tale of self-sacrifice and affection. But focus on her and her motives…and you start to wonder. If you accept that she genuinely thinks the Illusionist can work magic and has unlimited resources, then she’s at first a bit thick and by the end a total moron. Even without common sense her experiences should have made things clear, and they clearly aren’t living lives of luxury. If you think she’s figured it out, she’s a leech and a scrounger. Either way, there’s no reason why she shouldn’t get a job, why she shouldn’t realise that finding a new man in her life could upset her illusionist friend.

Some parts of the film are very funny, especially when the illusionist thinks his rabbit has been cooked. One shot at the end, when light moves as the pages of a book are blown in the wind, is stunningly beautiful. Edinburgh looks incredible, and its realisation was testament to the local artists used for the film. But there is so much more this film should have been, but wasn’t. I would be surprised – indeed, disappointed – if the film won the Oscar, even if it is more sophisticated and artistic than Toy Story 3 or How to Train Your Dragon. For sophistication and artistry are not all that go into a good film.