The Little Prince (Mark Osborne, 2015): France

Reviewed by Bryan Austin Gillison. Viewed at the Santa Barbara Film Festival 2016.

“What is essential is invisible to the eye” The Fox

The Little Prince, an animated adaptation of a popular novel by the same name, directed by Mark Osborne, made its US premier at the Santa Barbara International Film Festival and was met by a packed house of eager patrons. Mark Osborne is known for directing Kung Fu Panda and The Sponge Bob Square Pants movie. Members of the movie’s impressively star studded cast such as Jeff Bridges (The Aviator) and Marion Cotillard (The Rose)  introduced the film with Mark Osborne and gave some commentary about the making of the film. Although they were not in attendance, Rachel McAdams (The Mother), James Franco (The Fox), Paul Rudd (Mr. Prince), and Benicio Del Toro were also involved in the creation of the characters and their voices. Richard Harley does a masterful job of webbing modern sounds with old school european music. He allows a bouquet of french music to permeate the film’s audio landscape. Jeff Bridges oozes authenticity and wisdom as the Aviator; Marion Cotillard is sweet and sensual as the beloved Rose; James Franco is quirky and perfect as the fox.

The Little Prince written by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry is a popular children’s book that has been widely circulated since its original publication in 1943. This film takes advantage of 2D, 3D, and stop motion animation in order to give structure to the dizzying layered effect of framing a larger narrative around an existing fable. In the original narrative there is an Aviator who crashes his plane in the desert where he meets a small traveler who calls himself the Little Prince. The Little Prince tells him of his travels and that he has left a treasured rose on his home planet, and he also teaches the Aviator a lot about life along the way. In the movie, Osborne builds a larger, more modern framework around the source material. In the movie we are brought into a modern city where a little girl and her Mother move in next door to the Aviator. As the Girl develops a friendship with the Aviator he shares with her his hand-written and illustrated story (the original book and illustrations). To add even another layer of mise en abyme, we are presented with gorgeous stop motion flash back renditions of the source material as the Aviator unfolds his tale.

The entire film, a passion project of Osborne’s, reads over-all as earnest, loving, heart-felt, and worshipful of its source material. This is clear from the opening sequence that takes advantage of a 2D/3D animation combo to bring Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s original illustrations to life. Osborne adores The Little Prince. While the book itself is an allegory that takes a lot of its strength from ambiguity, the larger framework of the film spoon-feeds a specific interpretation of the source material to the viewer. It is important to be aware that this film is not a direct interpretation of the source material, but more of a companion piece that hopes to steer new readership to the book itself and keep the legacy alive.