Ernest & Celestine

Plot

Celestine is a young mouse who lives in the underground world of rodents. At the orphanage where she lives, the caretaker known as the Gray One tells scary stories about the evil nature of the bears that live in the outside world, though Celestine doubts that they are entirely true. She loves to draw but must soon study dentistry, since that's what all rodents do, and to prepare, she must travel above ground to collect the lost teeth of a cub from underneath pillows. On one such occasion, the bear family catches Celestine in the act and chases her into a trash can where she is trapped and spends the night. The next morning, a destitute and starving grizzly bear named Ernest discovers Celestine and attempts to eat her. Celestine convinces him to let her go by helping him break into the basement of a candy shop, where he can eat his fill. He is soon caught by the store's owner, however, and arrested. Celestine, who is behind on her quota of collected teeth, agrees to free him from the police wagon if he will help her break into and rob the teeth from the office of the store owner's wife, who happens to be a dentist.

Although the robbery initially seems successful, the pair soon find themselves being pursued by the police forces of both the rodent and bear cities. They manage to evade capture by stealing a van, and escape to Ernest's remote cabin. Ernest is initially reluctant to allow Celestine to stay with him, but they begin to bond after he discovers her love of art. He reveals to her that his current destitution is a result of his rejection of his family's plan for him to go into law, like his ancestors, due to his desire to become an entertainer. The two spend the winter happily together, though their joy is somewhat dampened by the constant radio broadcasts declaring that both police forces are still searching for them as well as how civil unrest has become rampant around both of their homes with the once submissive and complacent poor now rising up against their upper class oppressors.

In the Spring, the police are able to track the stolen van to the cabin. Ernest is arrested by the rodents, while Celestine is arrested by the bears. Both are simultaneously put on trial, in the main floor and basement of the same courthouse. Though each of them protest their unfair treatment along with the government's bias and prejudice, as well as refusing to sell out their respective companion, the furious judges refuse to listen. Ernest and Celestine then call the judges and the rest of the higher class out on their cruelty to the lower class common folk. During the proceedings, a fire is accidentally started in the courthouse, and while the rest of the citizens flee despite the furious judges' demands to stay, Ernest and Celestine each stay behind to rescue their respective judges. The judges are both humiliated and broken that their people, the ones they thought they could always rule, have abandoned them to save their own lives while the ones they sought to wrongfully punish are their saviors. Having truly admitted defeat in their own hearts, the shameful judges drop the charges against them and have no other choice then to grant their wish to be able to remain living together. All the while, the judges express their inability to comprehend the concept of unconditional bonds; and can only watch along with the shaken populace of each place as the courthouses burn to the ground.

Reunited in Ernest's cabin, the pair decide to write and illustrate a book, telling the story of their friendship, though with some embellishments after Celestine protests including the part of their meeting where Ernest attempted to eat her.

Cast

Production

The project was launched by producer Didier Brunner in late 2007, and an animated pilot was completed after a year. The search for funding for the film lasted until April 2009. From mid-2009 to mid-2010, the bulk of the work focused on developing the storyboard. The actual production phase, consisting of creating the animation, then lasted a year and a half, followed by a shorter post-production phase.

Start of the project and choice of directors

The film project originated as an initiative by producer Didier Brunner: having known the illustrated album series Ernest and Celestine for a long time, he seized the opportunity to acquire the audiovisual adaptation rights of the series when Gabrielle Vincent's nephew considered giving them up for an animated series; however, Brunner opted for a feature film. In December 2007, Didier Brunner contacted Benjamin Renner to work on an animated pilot defining the main orientations of the feature film project; Renner was then the artistic director. The realization of this animated pilot took about a year.

After its completion, the first director initially considered by Didier Brunner stepped down, and Brunner then proposed that Benjamin Renner direct the film; having never directed a feature film before, Renner requested to be teamed with more experienced co-directors, who are the Belgian Vincent Patar and Stéphane Aubier, directors of the animated series Panique au village (made in stop-motion animation using figurines). The film is thus co-directed by three directors: Benjamin Renner, Vincent Patar, and Stéphane Aubier. The film's actual production (after the pilot) began in 2009. The three directors divided tasks: all three worked together on the script, storyboard, and breakdown, then Benjamin Renner handled the graphic design of the film while Vincent Patar and Stéphane Aubier were involved again during post-production, for voices, sound effects, and mixing.

Screenplay

The screenplay was written by writer and screenwriter Daniel Pennac, then revised by the three directors according to the constraints of animation. The film team made an extra effort to stay true to the universe of Gabrielle Vincent’s books since she had refused all adaptation proposals during her lifetime, due to the very smooth and impersonal style of the proposed adaptation by an English studio. The team ultimately chose to create an homage rather than a literal adaptation of the book universe: Renner integrated Daniel Pennac's universe into the story, and the final narrative took the form of more of an entryway into the universe of the albums rather than a direct transposition, which resulted in a somewhat darker atmosphere for the film's screenplay. Benjamin Renner emphasized the creativity of the characters present in the initial screenplay proposed by Pennac and used it to reinforce the visual and narrative coherence of the film.

Graphics

The graphics of the film strive to be as faithful as possible to those of the original albums, particularly to the economy of lines in Gabrielle Vincent's drawings and the sense of spontaneity they exhibit.

The visual design of the characters is partly based on the albums and partly on inventiveness in the spirit of the album universe. In the project's early stages, the appearance of Ernest and Celestine was very close to that given by the original albums. It was through preliminary sketches that Benjamin Renner realized he had inadvertently modified the features of the two characters, even though Gabrielle Vincent herself had evolved from one album to another in her way of drawing them. Celestine is the one whose appearance underwent the most visible changes: her snout is shorter and her forehead more pronounced than in the albums, which slightly humanizes her features and makes her various expressions easier for animators to work on. The harmonization of this adaptation of the character graphics was ensured by animator Seï Riondet. The clothes worn by Ernest and Celestine are all inspired by those they wear in the various albums in the series. Seï also designed the numerous principal characters present in Pennac's script but without equivalents in Gabrielle Vincent's albums, totaling around 174 characters.

The landscapes in the film created by Zaza and Zyk are sometimes inspired by nature drawings by Gabrielle Vincent, whether in or out of the Ernest and Celestine albums. The court scenes are inspired by an album by Vincent Je voudrais qu'on m'écoute, which is not part of the Ernest and Celestine series and tells a story of running away. The underground city of rodents and the outfits of the gendarmes are influenced by the animated universe of Paul Grimault's The King and the Mockingbird. For the scenes depicting the crowd of police mice, which worried the producer due to the cost of their animation, Benjamin Renner came up with the idea of a collective character, a sort of mass that deforms as it moves, inspired by the movements of monsters from Princess Mononoke and the spirit from Spirited Away, both films by Hayao Miyazaki.

Music

The original score was composed by Vincent Courtois. It also includes two songs written by Thomas Fersen: one performed by him, and the other by Lambert Wilson.

Among the musicians who participated in the recording are Louis Sclavis, Dominique Pifarély, Michel Godard, François Couturier, and Vincent Courtois himself.

Animation

The first test animations, at the very beginning of the project, were created by Benjamin Renner, who sent them to the producer. Renner created these animations using Adobe Flash.

The production of the film lasted four years.

Reception

Box office

In France, the film, distributed by Studio Canal, was released on 12 December 2012, simultaneously with The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey by Peter Jackson (a major American production in fantasy), the American drama Beasts of the Southern Wild by Benh Zeitlin, the American thriller Arbitrage by Nicholas Jarecki, and two French comedies, Mes héros by Éric Besnard and Télé Gaucho by Michel Leclerc. Ernest and Celestine, distributed on 489 copies, accumulated admissions in its first week. In Paris, where the film is distributed on 20 copies, it attracted spectators on its opening day, achieving the second-best Parisian debut after The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey ( admissions on 28 copies). In its second week, the film recorded admissions, then accumulated more in its third week, thus surpassing admissions with admissions. With admissions in its fourth week, the film totaled admissions after one month of release. It gathered spectators in its fifth week, followed by others in its sixth week, totaling around admissions after six weeks.

In Belgium, where the film is distributed by Cinéart, Ernest and Celestine was released on 19 December 2012 and was shown in 36 theaters.

Critical reception

The film had its world premiere at the Directors' Fortnight, out of competition, at the Cannes Film Festival 2012. It received an excellent reception from French critics. In Le Monde, Isabelle Régnier saw it as a delight from start to finish, appreciating the drawings and the screenplay that respects the original series while inventing an original plot and developing its own reflection, something a bit more biting, a bit more political. In Libération, Éric Loret appreciated the work on the watercolors and soundscapes and was sensitive to the social relevance of Pennac's screenplay, which stuffed Gabrielle Vincent's plush universe with political unease. In Le Journal du dimanche, Stéphanie Belpêche regarded the film as a gem of French animation cinema with a story that is intelligent and terribly endearing. In the free newspaper Métro, Jennifer Lesueur appreciated the message of help and love conveyed by the film and the quality of the drawings: "the film gives the impression of flipping through an original watercolor album, where every gesture, every glance is measured".

The critical reception was also favorable elsewhere in the world. The film review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports a 98% approval rating, based on 81 reviews with an average score of 8.20/10; the general consensus states: "Sweet and visually charming, Ernest & Celestine offers old-fashioned delights for animation lovers of all ages." Metacritic assigns a score of 86 based on 22 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". Andrew Chan of the Film Critics Circle of Australia writes, "The result is a human story of two unlikely allies, a mouse living in harmony and befriending a bear. It is essentially that simple and it works just fine." Writing on Roger Ebert's website, Glenn Kenny of MSN awarded the film 3½ stars out of 4, praising it for its positive messages of friendship. Kenny wrote: "Ernest and Celestine is the coziest movie you'll likely see all year. Every frame is suffused with a fireplace kind of warmth that, for me at least, cast an immediate spell that didn't let up." The Belgian critic from RTBF appreciated the drawings, the music, and the story "endearing and funny while prompting reflection on discrimination". In Variety, Leslie Felperin considered Ernest and Celestine a "charming animated feature" and appreciated the film's overall fidelity to the book universe as well as the nuances brought to the story and humor; she found the work of the main voice actors "adorable" but questioned the foreign dubbings of the film.

Accolades

In June 2013, the film won the Award of the Hungarian National Student Jury at the 8th Festival of European Animated Feature Films and TV Specials.

TV series

A television series is adapted from the film, Ernest & Celestine, The Collection, made up of 52 episodes of 13 minutes and broadcast on France 5 on 1 April 2017. Near the end of 2017, a selection of four episodes of the series was released in theatres under the title Ernest & Celestine in Winter.

Sequel

In February 2022, StudioCanal announced that a sequel entitled Ernest & Celestine: A Trip to Gibberitia was in production, to be released on 14 December 2022. The film was directed by Julien Chheng and Jean-Christophe Roger.

References

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