A Film a Week - Pelikan Blue / Kék Pelikan

 previously published on Cineuropa

“The smell of freedom in the air...” In an Eastern European context, that phrase clearly conjures up the late 1980s and early 1990s, when the boxed-in communist states began to open up to the West’s capitalist goods and its way of life, which also brought freedom to travel, regarded as an essential element to enable young people to get acquainted with the big, wide world beyond the borders of their state. But what can a young person dying to live life to the fullest do if financial resources are scarce?

Working from an idea by Son of Saul producer Gábor Sipos and Gábor Szentpáli, and using audio interviews from the 2010s as his basis, filmmaker and animator László Csaki has composed a unique animated documentary that could serve as one of the answers to the above question. Pelikan Blue opened the Critics’ Picks Competition at the Black Nights Film Festival and feels ready to take the film-festival world by storm.

In some fast-paced narration that we hear over the imagery, deriving from different approaches to animation and even comprising some short bursts of filmed archival material, the narrator gives us a brief background story before introducing us to the three leading characters, young men named Ákos, Petya and Laci. They wanted to travel to the West but had no money, so they had to hustle a bit. An opportunity presented itself in the guise of the lo-tech way in which Hungarian Railways dealt with their international tickets: they were all hand-written on paper, with the titular carbon paper used to make copies, and were protected only by stamps. Led by Akos’s analytical, scientific mind, the guys came up with a scheme involving imported bleach, indigo paper and copied stamps to forge the international railway tickets.

Their first trip to Scandinavia went without a hitch, so they kept on indulging in trips all over Western Europe in the early 1990s. But word of their adventures got out and, pressured by their friend Rozi, who had his own list of clients, and spurred on by Petya’s urge to help a girl he liked, their operation first became a clandestine “service” for friends, and then a large-scale and somewhat lucrative scheme that attracted the attention of both the ticket inspectors and the police.

Combining a documentary foundation, an animated approach and a certain reliance on the tenets of a fiction film, Csaki takes the best of all three worlds and combines them with ease in order to tell a magnificent, nostalgic and heart-warming story, while jumping between the two timelines – one from the 1980s and 1990s, and another from the 2010s – leaves enough space for thought and reflection. Since the fast-paced narration serves as the primary means for plot delivery, animation was pretty much the only way to go. Blending the simple 2D foundation with some figurine animation and even filmed archival material suits the purpose very well, while the animation team’s attention to period details, such as the changes in fashion and scenery in the transitional times, is simply stellar. The passing of time is further commented on through the soundtrack, which emphasises it by using different genres of popular music that emerged over the 1990s.

Stitched together masterfully by Daniel Szabó and compressed to a pleasant running time of under 80 minutes, Pelikan Blue is the type of film that leaves a permanent smile on the viewer’s face. It has the power to make us believe that, not that long ago, the world was a far better place.

A Film a Week - Beanie / Kapa

 previously published on Cineuropa

Wonders do happen around Christmas time in Ljubljana. They might not be something we wished for, exactly, but they still have the ability to surprise us. Santa exists, yet there is not only one, but rather a whole syndicate of them. A dog that falls into our laps as a gift from the heavens might not be the right breed or might only have three legs. And a thieving vending machine might dispense its sweets and also spit out all of the money it had stolen before.

At least this is the case in Beanie, the third feature by Slobodan Maksimović. The film is branded as the first Slovenian Christmas movie, and it has been touring the specialised festivals (and the specialised children’s programmes of the regular film festivals) since the spring. Its national premiere is scheduled for the Festival of Slovenian Film, which is now under way. Beanie has already been dubbed into several languages and will enter distribution in various territories, including its home country, in November, just in time for Christmas.

All Lučka (newcomer Kaja Podreberšek) wanted for Christmas was a baby sister and a puppy. All Erik (Gaj Črnič, also a newcomer), who is also called “Beanie”, for obvious reasons (he always has his beanie on), wanted was to spend the holidays with his parents. Instead, he won the lottery at the home for youths where he lives (and where he is bullied), and the prize was to spend Christmas Eve with Lučka’s family. Their last name is Božič, which means “Christmas” in Slovenian, and this is exactly the joke that the home’s headmistress, Ana (Mojca Fatur), tries to crack.

So, instead of getting the presents she so desired, Lučka has to spend a hygge-style Christmas with her posh, yet absent-minded, parents Barbara (Ajda Smrekar) and Boris (Croatian actor Frano Mašković), and this boy from the youth home who has the strange habit of wearing his beanie at all times. Her initial discontent does not evaporate so easily. When she wakes up in the middle of the night, thinking that she has seen Santa coming to her house, Erik follows her, first in an attempt to prevent her from doing something stupid, then to protect her, and eventually taking the lead in their shared adventure. Christmas Eve in Ljubljana can be scary, but also magical.

Engagingly written by Saša Eržen, well acted and cleverly directed, Beanie could be regarded as one of the best children’s Christmas movies. The concepts it deals with are simple, but they can also be refined, strike a deep emotional chord and tell a meaningful truth (for instance, that kids love their parents even if they are good-for-nothing drunks). Furthermore, the chemistry between the young actors is natural, while the more experienced thesps pull some simple, effective stunts, and the sense of directing, opting for predominantly wider shots to put an emphasis on the atmosphere, while adding emotional significance to the close-ups, is spot on.

Beanie’s technical qualities are also top-notch. Sven Pepeonik’s cinematography captures the touristy and the not-so-touristy Ljubljana in the holiday period, while Jurij Moškon’s editing is fairly seamless. Michal Novinski’s score, using a wide range of instruments and evoking a neoclassical and jazzy mood, follows the emotion of the film perfectly, and the animation and visual effects by Michal Struss are also a valuable addition to the movie.

In the end, kids will enjoy Beanie, while the parents accompanying them should also remain interested in it. One can only appreciate all the effort and the emotion that must have been invested in such a project.

A Film a Week - April and the Extraordinary World / Avril et le monde truqué

A Film a Week is a weekly column on this blog, run on Sunday for our English-language readers and friends, presenting usually local or European festival films to a wider audience. Every review is directly written and not translated.

April and the Extraordinary World is really something, well, extraordinary. It is an animated feature, a delightful and wild adventure in a crazy, steam punk-themed world based on Jacques Tardi’s graphic novel, directed by Christian Desmares and Franck Ekinci and beautifully voiced by pleiad of French actors, including Marion Cotillard, Marc-Andre Grondin and Jean Rochefort. It is unmistakable Tardi’s work, but other influences can also be found, like Tintin, Miyazaki’s work and even live-action science fiction classics like Fritz Lang’s Metropolis.

Let’s start with the world. Imagine that Franco-Prussian war never occurred because Emperor Napoleon III got killed in a scientific experiment, and his son Napoleon IV signed the peace treaty that kept the French Empire and consolidated its place at the center of Europe. That would mean that the 2^nd Industrial Revolution that brought us combustion engine and electricity would be postponed and the world would be stuck with steam engines only. But over the span of several decades, the resources like coal and wood became scarce, which led to the energy wars with the League of America for the Canadian forest, poverty and a gray and dusty world. It seams that the only good thing is that there are two Eiffel Towers.

The year is 1931, and the government is hunting the scientists to help with the research. That is, the ones who are not disappearing on their own since the accident. Since the greatest minds are nowhere to be found, the government is left with the mediocre ones. Inspector Pizoni wants to change it by capturing Prosper, nicknamed Pops, his son Paul and daughter-in-law Annette who have been working in secret on the potion of immortality. When Paul and Annette get killed in the chase, their daughter April is left alone in the world, aside the talking cat Darwin, a clear side-effect of the immortality experiments.

Ten years later, April is living in hiding and working on the potion trying to save Darwin’s life. She is still the target of Pizoni who wants to get Pops through her. But the accidental meeting with a thief-turned-police informant Julius sets the new adventure in motion that will the characters and the viewers beyond their wildest dreams. Think of the invention of electricity, robot-rats, steam punk planes, moving houses, intelligent mutated lizards and whatnot.

Every scene has at least one brilliant punchline, a witty comedic turn or a piece of imaginative steam punk technology. Even though the structure is somewhat off, with the introduction being a bit too long and the ending that feels rushed, and the plot doesn’t make too much sense (no more or less than a standard issue animated adventure), but those small gems like bicycle-powered zeppelins, long distance cable cars, the head of the Emperor’s statue converted into living quarters, switches hidden in globe model, re-imagination of steam-powered cars, radio and television are enough to make April and the Extraordinary World a great experience. It’s larger than life story about sustainability, hopes for a better future, beautifully voiced and elegantly hand-drawn with simple lines, it feels so retro and so new at the same time.