A Cat in Paris (Une Vie de Chat, 2010)

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The rooftops of Paris never looked better than they do when Dino is elegantly walking on them during the night. This cat is living with a seven year old girl named Zoé; he loves her, he sleeps in her embrace, and gives her the lizards he catches as presents. Zoé has become mute after the killing of her father by the gangster Victor Costa, whom her mother, a police inspector named Jeanne, is busy hunting down. At the same time, when Dino goes out of the apartment he joins a very capable and kind-hearted burglar named Nico in his spectacular nightly endeavours over the rooftops. And it is up there that these two separate worlds will meet: one night Zoé will follow Dino, and the cat, the burglar, and her mother, will join forces to save her from the gangster. Such are the narrative premises of A Cat in Paris, an unusually beautiful animated film by Jean-Loup Felicioli and Alain Gagnol.

A Cat in Paris is a testament to the brilliance of hand-drawn animation. Character design is highly original, and the settings display a similar expressionist aesthetic. As Alain Gagnol told Ramin Zahed of Animation Magazine, computers were used only for colouring purposes, and even the lights on the characters are hand-drawn. The film includes more than a few imaginative gems: Nico’s slick moves on rooftops and window ledges; the visualisation of perfume as detected by Dino; an octopus-like version of Victor Costa in Jeanne’s hallucination; and a whole sequence in the dark, during which characters appear just as their plain white outline against a black background, and are intelligently contrasted to their full coloured selves when suddenly someone strikes a match. 

The narrative content puts forward well-developed characters, both male and female, in a clear and effectively paced plot. It is exceptionally good when it comes to the issue of dealing with grief and loss, which is treated with care and insight; Zoé’s silent gestures are emotionally expressive, and the moments she starts to speak are particularly moving. There are, however, some minor weaknesses in the screenplay; for example, the recurrent joke about a noisy dog getting hit is not in the best taste, and Dino’s expression of satisfaction as Victor Costa falls to his death is not compatible with the character.  

One of the most interesting aspects of the film is that the unconventional alliance between Nico and Jeanne blurs the line separating the two sides of the law; as a key dialogue between them has it, the police save the thief as the thief saves the child. All three will celebrate Christmas together, thus constituting an alternative type of family, which is introduced in the final scene through Dino’s entrance in the apartment. This is hardly surprising of course: no unity can ever be complete without a member as adorable as a cat! 

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