April and the Extraordinary World

Inspired by the graphic novels of the great French comic artist Jacques Tardi, this animated French feature is a steampunk adventure set in an alternate reality Paris, circa 1941, where the World Wars never occurred, electricity was not discovered, and the smoke that powers the steam-based energy economy pollutes the world. It's also an increasing rarity in feature animation: a film made in the classic 2D hand-drawn manner, with designs modeled on Tardi's clean, strong, storybook illustration style. The titular heroine is a spunky, smart girl whose scientist parents were abducted by a mysterious force. April lives in hiding with a talking cat, carrying on her parents' experiments to cure the dying feline while also dangerously continuing to search for her parents. Imagine Oliver Twist meets Jules Verne as a whimsical fantasy fable with darker overtones as April's odyssey takes her to an underground world where talking lizards and human scientists work together to cure the polluted world, although there is trouble in this paradise as well. The story carries messages of environmental responsibility and anti-militarism while also celebrating science and technology as a public good—albeit one that can also be misused for evil. Presented with both the original French and English language soundtracks (the former featuring the voices of Jean Rocheford, Olivier Gourmet, and Marion Cotillard; the latter with the voices of Paul Giamatti, J.K. Simmons, and Susan Sarandon), this is recommended. (S. Axmaker)