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Beautifully animated and faithful to the spirit of its classic source material, The Little Prince is a family-friendly treat that anchors thrilling visuals with a satisfying story.Read critic reviews
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The Aviator introduces a girl to a world where she rediscovers her childhood and learns that it's human connections that matter most, and that it is only with heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.
I haven't read the book this film takes it's inspiration from, but from what I could basically gather the stop-motion sequences are fairly accurate to the original story, but the framing device with the CGI little girl and old man are entirely new. The stop-motion sequences are all great. First of all, they look beautiful, and have an eerie hypnotic quality to them. Their storytelling is kind of in the form of fables, and highly symbolic, but the messages are timeless. The framing device for the most part works well. I take slight issue with it because it does work towards grounding a lot of the fables in a concrete world, and I don't know if that's really necessary. I think kids are smarter than we give them credit for, and we don't need to put it in a world they relate to completely to make the story work. That being said, it's a longer story now, and since they are doing it this way they do at least do it well. The parallels work, and they never make it too modern. It's very clearly in a world more resembling ours than the magical realism of The Little Prince's world, but there's no forced pop culture references or overly wacky comedy a la a bad Dr. Seuss film. The climax is where I do start to take a bit of issue though. For one, I thought the film went a little too long. It's not even that long, but it doesn't need to be, and at the point when I was ready for it to start wrapping up I realized there was 40 minutes left because it had to take a really weird detour that doesn't totally work. But even the parts that don't work too well aren't that bad, they're just not as good as the rest. Because the rest of it is so good. The stories of the Little Prince are all beautiful, and the framing device of the old man and girl and their strange friendship is genuinely touching. It's a great film, not perfect, but still great. It has a strong message of holding onto childhood that did get to me a little bit, and there's plenty of other sparks of truth sprinkled throughout that will be effective for kids and adults.
A beautiful papery, textured animation of the Exupery classic, unfortunately surrounded by a highly conventional framing animation extolling the need to not be boring in worn-out terms. Much overuse of imagery from 'The Wall', 'Brazil', 'The Apartment' and other dystopian fantasies. The put-upon child has the same face as any other Pixar kid. Le Petit Prince grows up into a miserable janitor and needs rescuing. The businessman captures the stars and crushes them to fuel his corporation. The rose is dead and baobabs have overcome the Prince's asteroid.
Things are set to right (obviously) but the fluttering, Sufist magic of the original tale is drowned out by the bombast of a mundane CGI adventure. People do not seem to understand the destructive power of excitement. The businessman wasn't an ogre in the book; he was blind: he needed help. Plus the Tippler and the Lamplighter do not even appear (they are referred to visually but ignored in the script.) If you can watch only the bits relating to the original tale, do that. I may do my own edit just to see what it looks like. I imagine it is twenty minutes of ephemeral beauty, just like the book.
Super Reviewer
Nov 09, 2016
Where do I possibly begin to describe just how incredible this film truly is? There have been many impressive animated films throughout the years, but many are geared toward a younger audience. There are very few that challenge their audience in the way that The Little Prince does, but that is only the beginning of what makes this film an absolute masterpiece. There is a core story to this film, but many things are left up to the interpretation of its audience, and while I think certain things happened throughout the course of this film, other may not have. The Little Prince is one of the greatest animated feature films in recent memory, and here is why.
Originating as a French film before being brought to the rest of the world and dubbed in different languages for a wider audience, it just goes to show that there are many more great films out there that are hard to find. To put it simply, a little girl moves into a new home with her mother, in preparation for a very prestigious school. During the summer, she must follow every rule set in motion by her mother. When her mother leaves for work, she slowly discovers an elderly man living next door and he introduces her to the story of The Little Prince. Trying to convince her that this little boy is real and this other world exists where amazing things happen, they form a very strong bond with one another. From beginning to end, this film gleams with originality. Although it is a film that has child-like visuals, its core story is much more mature than one might expect.
Children seem to feel as though their parents work too much and they never get to see them enough. We live in a world where children do not understand the motivation of their parents actions. The Little Prince takes that notion and takes a quite literal approach to displaying this on screen. This strange other universe has places where only children exist, finding every adult strange and others that have the same, yet reversed ideal. These ideals only work if the core characters of the film are interesting enough to want to see them venture into these worlds, and because they are, this film flows like a fictional piece of art. After viewing this film, I truly do not have a single complaint about the display of this fictional world. Sure, if you are to break down logic and not allow your mind to open wider than usual, you may find some flaws that bug you, but that is not what great storytelling is. Great storytelling is when a film allows you to open your mind and escape into a world that you wish you were in.
Doing something that really has never been done in a major motion picture before, The Little Prince has three very different styles of animation throughout. There is the clean-looking visuals for the core storyline, the 2D hand-drawn animation to display the other world in story form, and the in-between where the story comes to life in order to dive deeper into the characters in the story. For many reasons, this style works wonders for this picture, as the audience is able to experience a few twists and turns that will leave them speechless. There are multiple occasions in the final act of this film that had me tearing up. There are very few characters to follow here, which makes the impact of their arcs that much more compelling. You truly feel as though you know these characters inside out by the end of the picture.
Not having seen the original French version, I can only vouch for the voice talent in the American version, but I am sure the original is just as spectacular as this one. Every performance feels as though they care about their character and give a very down to earth performance. From the magnificent storytelling, to the perfection of its screenplay, to its unique and original visuals, The Little Prince is one of the most incredible animated films I have seen in many, many years. I am not quite sure if this film is eligible for an Academy Award, seeing as it was released in 2015 in its own country and then officially released globally this year, but if I am able to count this film as a 2016 release, it is easily one of the best you will see all year. This picture is the reason why I love film. The Little Prince is an animated masterpiece.
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