Out on a limb at Mike Lief.com

Main

November 30, 2008

Les Triplettes de Belleville

This is the official music video for the title song from the French animated feature, Les Triplettes de Belleville, nominated a few years back for an Academy Award.

The guitar playing is strongly reminiscent of Django Reinhart (who has a brief, animated cameo near the end of the music video), the melody impossible to force from my head; it's been rattling around in there for days, my wife forced to listen to me humming snippets all weekend long.

The film itself is a pretty amazing work, using highly stylized animation to tell a tale with almost no dialogue, rendering its Gallic origins almost moot as an obstacle to English speakers' enjoyment and understanding of the story. I found myself thinking that it was a pure form of entertainment, a direct descendant of the early silent films in that the language of the audience -- wherever it might be -- wasn't important, because the images, the visual medium itself, told the story so well.

The Tours de France figures in the plot, along with illegal gambling, organized crime, three old women who used to be famous singers, and ... well, a bunch of other stuff.

But the best part -- aside from the music -- is the dog, Bruno, who has an uncanny ability to always make it to the bedroom window just in time to bark at the passing train.

And in case you're wondering, the lyrics don't really make any sense in English, so just surrender to the toe-tapping lunacy of "Belleville Rendez-vous", sung (and acted in the video) by Matthieu Chedid.

For a better sense of what the film's about -- kinda' sorta -- check out the trailer.