'Little Prince' retold in breathtaking stop-motion animation
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A scene from the movie “The Little Prince,” directed by Mark Osborne / Courtesy of Wise & Wide Entertainment
By Yun Suh-young
It is never an easy job to make a film adaptation of a popular classic because, unless it is done superbly, it will likely face disappointment and criticism from devoted readers anticipating a film as good as the book. Yet, directors still go through the pains and risks of recreating great books on the big screen.
"The Little Prince," to be released Dec. 23 locally, is the first animated feature film based on the work by French author Antoine de Saint-Exupery, and it does right by the source material.
Directed by Mark Osborne, whose previous works include “Kung Fu Panda,” the animation makes a brave attempt to do justice to the classic tale that has been printed in 250 languages and sold 145 million copies all over the world, on a huge-scale budget of $80 million.
The movie isn't a straight adaptation of Saint-Exupery's novel, though. Instead of reproducing the original story on the screen, the director makes an attempt to connect with today's audiences, adding a modern-day backdrop to contrast with the tale of “The Little Prince,” which is woven into the film's narrative.
The plot involves a young girl, nurtured by a single “helicopter” mom who has charted out her daughter's entire life on a magnetic planning board, demanding a suffocating education regimen so the girl can enter an exclusive private school.
The girl ― whose name is unknown ― and her overbearing mother move to a new neighborhood to get a better chance of entering the private school where the mother plans to send her daughter.
While following the minute-by-minute planned schedule of her mother, who claims this is the way that her daughter will grow up to be a "great adult," the girl encounters an old man next door, an eccentric neighbor who turns out to be a retired aviator.
The old aviator befriends the girl by telling her the story of “The Little Prince,” which he claims to be true as he personally met the extraterrestrial voyager, the little prince, when his airplane crashed in the desert.
When the aviator tells his story of the little prince, the scenes switch from the original narrative to a stop-motion animation featuring beautifully handcrafted rustling-paper techniques in watercolors. The scenes take viewers into the world of “The Little Prince,” a whimsical and mystical realm, which is a visual treat throughout the film.
The original narrative of the film is set in a modern metropolis where uptight adults live and go about their cookie-cutter lives. These scenes are done with computer graphics.
In congruence with the message of The Little Prince, the film criticizes the stiff-mindedness of the adults and emphasizes the importance of remembering childhood innocence with lines such as the aviator's, "I managed to grow up but I never forgot the little prince" or, "growing up is not a problem; forgetting is."
When the girl is with the old aviator ― the film's narrator who is assumed to be a fictional version of Saint-Exupery himself ― she learns to become a real child, full of imagination, creativity and innocence, instead of an adult avatar.
When the old aviator is hospitalized due to old age, it saddens the girl as death might separate them, so she embarks on a quest to (literally) find the Little Prince to bring him to his old friend.
In a planet full of monochrome-colored high-rise buildings and darkly dressed, expressionless adults, she spots the Little Prince who has grown to adulthood and is faithfully working to please the businessmen. There, the Prince, stripped of the vestiges of childhood, is immersed in routine work in razor-sharp buildings.
Disappointed with the Prince, the girl escapes with him and takes him back to the planet where he came from.
"It is only with heart that one can see rightly," says the Little Prince. “What is essential is invisible to the eye."
The beautifully composed soundtrack by Richard Harvey and Hans Zimmer adorns the film adding to the emotional impact of the story.
The downside is that there are some scenes that drag, and the storyline, going back and forth between past and present, may confuse children. Still, the film is a touching tale for all ages, but may hit home more for adults who've read the book.
The movie features the voices of Jeff Bridges, Rachel McAdams, Paul Rudd, Marion Cotillard and James Franco.