The Many Faces of the European Animated Features
Right now, many eyes in Europe are focused on the release of Arthur and the Invisibles. A EuropaCorps production, this project comes from the company of the producer and director Luc Besson, who has experienced great success at the French and European box offices with movies like The Big Blue, La Femme Nikita and The Fifth Element.
Arthur and the Invisibles is a CG feature movie, using 3D and mocap, and destined to appeal to a family audience. The movie boasts the biggest budget ever given to an animated European animated movie, around 65 million Euros. In reality, this prodigious investment will pay off as two movies will be made back to back.
This amount is incomparably larger than the average animated feature budget, that, according to Corinne Jenart of CARTOON, is around 7 million Euros today.
With 1.5 million Euros in ticket sales in France, Astérix and the Vikings, another big European production that was released in early 2006, didn't meet expectations. It stayed well below the performance of Astérix et Obélix: Mission Cléopâtre, a live-action release a few years before. So everybody is waiting for the release of Arthur...
An Impressive Variety These projects are often based on a children author's or a comicbook artist's universe, where the artistic content is often fully developed. This creates a big diversity of inspired projects and graphic techniques, compared to other methods of development where conformity and the influence of commercial studios like Pixar and DreamWorks are noticeable.
It has been apparent that the weak point of most of these movies is the lack of international market opportunities. For every Piccolo, Saxo et compagnie (produced by Millimages and Haut and Court), which was sold to The Weinstein Co. a few weeks ago, how many other European features will only find an audience in their countries of origin?
Even with the release of big titles like Arthur and Flushed Away (the Aardman and DreamWorks feature), the large diversity of European productions is apparent. In Europe, animation features are still financed by public organizations like Eurimage, and sometimes with important government financial aid. Producers that are traditionally very much involved in TV series in Europe, don't really step into features as well.
The French Specificity There is a unique characteristic of European movies that can explain their often weak performances abroad. As the movies are made with quite modest budgets, bigger countries manage to reap the financial benefits in their own territories, accumulating theater and DVD receipts. Smaller countries also suffer as their local markets are smaller, making them more likely to look for foreign partnerships that may cut down their revenue. Even with obstacles indigenous to Europe, Ocelot is one of the few European animation directors whose movies are doing well abroad.
Unfortunately, that's not the case for another cute movie that also was released last autumn. U, directed by the illustrator Grégoire Solotareff and Serge Elissade, which hasn't scored well at the box office. It's of course easy to explain the failure of a movie once released, but it's fair to say that U didn't really reach its audience. The producers, excited maybe by a first unexpected success (Loulou), seem to have neglected the target audience, and, as a result, there was no support from moviegoers. Strongly attached to the notion of giving authors free creative rein, European animation experiences some success thanks to its "open mind," but sometimes suffers from the boundless limits it gives to the authors.
Very jealous about their specificities, some French professionals limit their co-productions to their fellow countrymen, sometimes rightfully thinking that it will guarantee involvement on their projects. In this way, Ocelot (Azur and Asmar) and Jacques Rémy Girard of Folimage (Raining Cats and Frogs) have parallel approaches. They both come from the short films universe and, as directors, guide their productions carefully.
The recent release of Azur and Asmar, the new Michel Ocelot movie (Kirikou) gave the French media occasion to celebrate their favorite author. Inspired and original, this movie offers a very graphic 3D treatment and a message of love and tolerance that hit its mark. Coming in second at the box office behind Open Season, with more than 400,000 Euros ticket sales in the first week, Azur has since slowed down its pace, but still has surpassed 1 million Euros in ticket sales, providing optimism for its future total box office revenue.
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