Saturday, July 14, 2007

Film — Azur and Asmar: The Prince's Quest

Gloriously and sumptuously animated (Poser-esque 3D with an interesting touch that worn cloth was rendered in flat colour -- no shading whatsoever), French (subtitled) and Arabic (untranslated).

Azur, blue eyed son of French gentry, and Azmar, his twin brother-in-milk, son of his Moorish wet-nurse, grow up together, enchanted by her tales of the Djinn Fairy.

Time passes. Azur is sent away to learn to be a gentleman; Azmar and his mother are sent packing. But the lure of the Djinn Fairy continues, and, risking all, Azur, when grown, sets off to find her and free her from captivity.

A po-mo reworking of many traditional fairy-tale quest themes, in a happily tolerant and multi-culti Araby (clearly there is a bit of a political message close to the surface here, especially relevant to contemporary France) -- a thoroughly nice film, woefully underattended at its one showing.

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