Back Seat Producers

Originally, this was not going to be the movie that I was intending to see this weekend.  That would’ve been Unknown with Liam Neeson.  But unexpectedly (for me, anyway), Sylvain Chomet’s newest movie, The Illusionist came here to St. Louis, and further at one of my favorite theatres in town, so I had to leap at the chance to see it.

The Illusionist is a 2010 release and something you won’t necessarily find at your local multiplex, it is an art house movie, but with absolute universal appeal.  It’s also one of the three nominated movies for Best Animated Feature Film for the 2010 Academy Awards (the other two being Toy Story 3 and How To Train Your Dragon.

Tatischeff is a stage musician whose better days are now behind him.  As this is taking place, Rock ‘N Roll music is making it’s debut and television is becoming more and more pervasive.  Tatischeff is eking out a living, playing to very small audiences.  His act is appealing to a drunken Scotsman who happens to see him performing at a wedding.  The Scotsman invites Tatischeff to come to his town to perform where he’s actually a big hit with his act.  But the biggest appeal lies with a young serving girl named Alice, who’s not just drawn to Tatischeff because of his act, but also because of great kindness that he’s shown her.

Tatischeff leaves the small village, and unexpectedly finds Alice coming with him.  Soon Tatischeff finds more work performing at a theatre in Edinburgh, where he’s also faced with not just providing for himself, but Alice as well.

Previously, Sylvain Chomet really impressed me with his prior animated feature, The Triplets of Belleville. Now adapting an original, but unproduced, screenplay from French filmmaker Jacques Tati, we have this latest film and it’s an absolutely beautiful experience.

I am not familiar with any of Tati’s previous films.  Thanks to Ignatiy Vishnevetsky of the new Ebert Presents At The Movies (an excellent show that if you’re reading this, you should be watching as well), I’ve now sudden interest in seeing Tati’s Playtime. In addition, The Illusionist itself makes reference to Tati’s Mon Oncle. Those two movies, along with Tati’s M. Hulot’s Holiday are all available on Netflix Instant Play and have all been added to my own queue.  So now, I’m very much looking forward to discovering Tati’s work for myself, and if The Illusionist is any indication, I expect I’m in for a fantastic time.

The animation in The Illusionist is absolutely incredible.  This is traditional hand-drawn, 2D animation (with some digital enhancement).  What’s amazing about it is the subtlety of character that’s here and just how much Chomet has going on in any given scene.  Traditionally with American animation, we’re used to one major focus in a scene, and while that is here, there is just as much attention paid to all of little background elements.

There is actually very little spoken dialogue in the film.  When it does come up, it’s not necessarily meant to be taken literally, but more as expressing a feeling behind a moment, and it works.  We’re drawn into the characters of Tatischeff, Alice and their relationship purely through the visuals, with the small bits of dialogue being more scene punctuations more than anything else.

The Illusionist is a beautiful, bittersweet film that amazed me not just due to it’s technical prowess, but also due to it’s characters and the life they live throughout the piece.  It has genuine moments of comedy (though gentle), pathos and is a fine example of the type of adult animation that we should have more of.  I was sad to see that we only had about ten people in our audience to see this film (though we were seeing this at a later show time) and this deserves to be seen by more.  Toy Story 3 was one of my favorite movies of 2010, and I expect it to win the Oscar for Best Animated Feature Film, but I wouldn’t be unhappy at all if The Illusionist came in and took that award.  Very much highly, highly recommended.

In 120 A.D., as Rome sought to expand it’s empire to the North and the West, they encountered sizable resistance from the Picts in Britain.  Seeking to take control, Rome’s Ninth Legion with 5,000 soldiers fell before the Picts, in disgrace to their country.

In the 20 years that have passed at the start of The Eagle, it’s been established that Rome had constructed a wall cutting off this region of Britain.  Now, the son of the general of the Ninth Legion, Marcus Flavius Aquila, seeks to regain his family’s honor by taking command of a small garrison near the wall. In a battle against a Pict tribe, Marcus’ troops hold back the tribe, though Marcus suffers from an injury that then has him honorably discharged from his command.

As Marcus recuperates, he manages to save the life of a Briton slave, Eska, during a gladiatorial battle.  And though Eska despises everything that Marcus stands for, he owes him his life and swears allegiance to him.  Marcus hears that the golden eagle standard that belonged to the Ninth has been seen in the possession of one of the Pict tribes, the Seals. Recovered from his injuries, Marcus seeks to take back the eagle, with Eska by his side.

That’s the basic premise of The Eagle, the new movie from director Kevin Macdonald who has previously helmed the films The Last King of Scotland and  State of Play, neither of which I’ve seen.  This is also the second recent movie to use the fall of the Ninth Legion as it’s centerpiece, the other being Neil Marshall’s last film, Centurion, but more about that later.

Overall, I thought that The Eagle wasn’t bad, but it doesn’t really do a whole lot to distinguish itself either.  It’s pace is very leisured and in some places is just a little laborious.  The film has a serviceable look to it which gets a little more impressive as we get further into Marcus’ and Eska’s journey.  The fight scenes aren’t bad, though they are tightly cut and shot close up.  They serve their purpose and nothing more.  The best part of the film is the relationship between Marcus and Eska, but even that is on the very dry side.

Channing Tatum plays Marcus and Jamie Bell plays Eska.  Both actors look terrific in their parts and they do their best with what they have here, with Bell’s intensity as the standout between the two.  Tatum does his best to garner sympathy for his character, but it doesn’t give you the rousing drive that you want out of something like this.  Still, for Tatum, this is pretty decent work.  Donald Sutherland plays Marcus’ uncle, who we see during Marcus’ recuperation period.  His performance, as is those of the other actors playing Romans, is very casual, which doesn’t quite give off the air of imperialism that you sort’ve want out of something like this.  From what I understand though, that was a decision on Kevin Macdonald’s part to sort of buck the trend of how we normally see Romans portrayed on film.  Mark Strong also briefly shows up in the movie as Guern, a former Ninth Legionnaire, who saw the futility of the Ninth’s battle and left to survive.  Strong’s almost unrecognizable when you see him, though it almost doesn’t matter as there’s not a whole lot done with him here.

The Eagle isn’t a bad movie, it’s just average.  The pieces are there to make this a rousing piece of entertainment, but it seems to me that director Macdonald is deliberately underplaying everything.  Why?  I don’t know, maybe to keep it more grounded in reality than anything else.  That may be the case, and at the same time clips The Eagle’s wings.

Now, I also mentioned Neil Marshall’s Centurion above and I just watched that before going to see The Eagle (it’s available in high definition on Netflix Instant Play).  Now, I’m already a fan of Marshall’s, his previous films Dog Soldiers and Doomsday are just a hell of a lot of fun, and The Descent was one of my top ten favorites for 2005.  Centurion, which is very much influenced by Walter Hill’s movie, The Warriors, delivers on just about every count.  It’s beautifully shot, the action scenes are spectacular, and the performances are absolutely terrific with standout work from lead Michael Fassbender and Olga Kurylenko.  This wasn’t widely released theatrically which is a shame because it deserved to be seen on a big screen.  So basically, I offer that up as an alternative if you’re wanting to see a movie based around the fall of the Ninth Legion.  The Eagle is workmanlike and average, but Centurion soars.