There may be a literary film here, and there may be a horror film here. I don't know if you will be so dull to fall asleep, or even scared to fall asleep. Tonight, I will tell the story of a lizard couple who wanted to rule the world, but was defeated by a cat. In the live steampunk era, technology was blocked before the invention of electricity; animals became "essences" and cherished the dream of the mother of the earth, and the human world became more and more constrained by centralized governments and secret police due to scarcity of resources. What hue should such an animation be? Naturally, the lines should be thick and dark and the colors should be dark like the old European cartoon books, and even the story itself should be heavy.
But "Avil and the Fictional World", this French film adapted from acques Tardi's graphic novel, was produced by a team led by Christian Desmares and Franck Ekinci for six years. It not only resurrected the steampunk era in the original book, but also by the way. Contributed to an unusually determined scientist girl, an eccentric old scientist grandfather, a pair of scientist parents who have different opinions and pursue their ideals, and an amazing energetic scholar-type immortal cat.
The rare thing about these roles is that each of them has an independent spirit, and they can seek common ground while reserving differences and understand each other even if their family members have different opinions. The heroine is a copy of the brave girl in Hayao Miyazaki's manga. The difference is that she is very unbeautiful, with a collapsed nose and rough appearance, and she has no graceful appearance, but she is bold, clever, and does not have the idea of looking for a prince charming. She is both tolerant and tolerant. Open-minded, completely subverted the custom of "animated beautiful girls".
Because of their existence, even if the overhead world in the story is completely green, soot is in the sky, the war is on the verge, and the political pressure will not make people very depressive. The well-known independent studio Gkids has risen rapidly in recent years due to high-quality hand-drawn animations. This film is their latest production.
The aesthetics of steampunk is amazing. In the 19th century, endless stone houses and thick narrow stone roads can be seen from the top of the mountain. The sky is another scene-a huge vault-shaped railway station, a steam-powered air carriage, and the beauty of machinery reaches its peak at this time.
Does it remind you of the repeated scenes in "Doctor Who" and the people wandering between science and ignorance?
The story of the film is also the same as in "Doctor Who", because an occasional historical event caused a completely different scene from the present world. In 1870, Napoleon III secretly visited the scientist Gustav Franklin on the eve of the Franco-Prussian War and asked him whether he had developed a mysterious potion that would make French soldiers immortal. Unfortunately, Franklin's research was not successful, but it had a wonderful side effect: it gave animals the wisdom of humans. Napoleon was furious and wanted to shoot two talking lizards. Unexpectedly, it caused an explosion and was buried in the flames with the scientist, but the lizards escaped.
In a blink of an eye into 1931, Franklin’s son "Popps" and grandson Paul and granddaughter-in-law Annette avoided the government's pursuit (at this time, the Napoleon Kingdom was capturing scientists across the territory to develop weapons of war for the empire), while continuing the research of old Franklin— -The ultimate serum. However, they have escaped the pursuit of the government, but they have not escaped the capture of mysterious dark clouds. In the chaos, the grandfather "Popps" fled, the whereabouts of Paul and his wife are unknown. Their youngest daughter Avil and the talking cat Darwin are hidden in the huge bronze statue of Napoleon in the center of Paris, and they continue to study.
A good movie is not afraid of spoilers, so continue to tell the story. The family met again by chance (with the "help" of the secret police who had hunted them for many years and the gangsters he hired), but the location was an underground world that humans could not imagine. The two monitor lizards who fleeed that year abducted many top scientists and established a green world that was completely different from that on the ground. Here, scientists and lizards coexist peacefully, playing music, and scientists are also curious about the lizard’s "cockroach bento". The most important thing is that they think that they not only escape the high-pressure domination and pollution on the ground, but also hope to let the green spread and create hope for all living things to survive.
Everything is ready, just wait for the "ultimate serum". Unfortunately, the female lizard has always cherished this good wish-hope that the green seeds can be brought to the universe by the rocket and the immortal serum, but it has long been tampered with by the male lizard. At the last moment, he swallowed the "ultimate serum" and ordered the rocket to destroy the human world. In his opinion, the rule of the human society by animals will prevent the world from being left untouched by the world. In the end, the earth was of course not destroyed, because the Darwin cat rushed into the rocket at the very moment, bringing the green color to many planets. "Madman" male lizards and "Mother of the earth" female lizards fell together with their lizard kingdom, and the earth continued to enter a boring and progressive era-the villain's secret police was rewarded, and mankind finally entered the age of electricity; the Franklin family was dying old Then, Darwin, the undead cat, was finally discovered by the moon-lander on the far moon and sent a distant greeting to the earth.
At this time, it is difficult not to keep his eyes moist, and Darwin learns to be rich again, and after all, he is still a cat. How much he likes the company of Avil and his family, he has lived alone in the universe for so long. Much suitable for a sensational plot, "Avigil and the Fictional World" did not make a fuss about it, but calmly took it. The emotion of the film is as restrained and respectable as its tone. In another place, grandfather and granddaughter finally meet again. In the room grandfather prepared for his granddaughter, the closet is full of small to large dresses and gifts all over the floor. Obviously, grandpa bought and waited here alone year after year. Avigil puts on the dress, but the camera skips the gratification and touch of grandpa seeing the granddaughter in the dress. He knows how to leave blank.
Finally, let’s talk about the game between lizards, scientists, and governments, as well as the relationship between humans, animals, and nature. If technology stagnates, the human world is likely to fall into a fight as depicted in the film, and it is also very likely that centralized and terrorist governments will appear, stifling human imagination. But if scientists are not hijacked by lizards and human technology continues to develop, then the reality is not now-the ecology is destroyed, the earth becomes hot, humans may be forced to abandon the earth, or there will be a mass extinction.
As for the ideal of the female lizard, just as idealists are often killed by careerists, her partner betrayed their ideals at a critical moment. With human thinking and intelligence, it also has human selfishness and cruelty. Therefore, the male lizard decided to destroy human beings and rule the earth, and make himself immortal. At the moment they are not representing animals, but another lizard-type human. Even if the ideal of female lizards is realized, lizards with human strengths and weaknesses will eventually confront humans. The situation at this time is also difficult to escape large-scale turmoil.
Paul and Annette, who were caught here, are well aware of these possibilities. It's just that they each made different judgments-Annette believed in the ideals of the female lizard, while Paul was more pessimistic, seeing the inevitable large-scale turmoil in the future, and therefore resolutely refused to cooperate. This is a film worth thinking about. If you follow the context of this overhead world, many possibilities will come to you, which is a very challenging brain game. If you don’t want to fall into the trap of possibility, it is also very enjoyable. If green and machinery can coexist, how beautiful this world should be!
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