Arthur and the Minimoys (French: Arthur et les Minimoys, also known as Arthur and the Invisibles in North America) is a 2006 English-French adventure comedy fantasy live-action feature film adaptation of the 2002 children's book Arthur and the Minimoys, and the 2003 sequel Arthur and the Forbidden City, written by filmmaker Luc Besson, who also directed the film. It premiered in limited release in France on November 29, 2006, and received wide releases in a number of countries in the following weeks. In the United States, it opened on December 29, 2006, for one week in Los Angeles, California, with a wider release on January 12, 2007 and it was released in the United Kingdom on February 2, 2007. With a budget of €60 million, Arthur and the Invisibles was briefly the most expensive French film production until surpassed by Astérix at the Olympic Games. The film received negative reviews from critics and was a box office flop. The movie's soundtrack album was released on January 9, 2007.
Plot[]
In the year 1960, Arthur lives with his grandmother, Daisy, in a quiet farm house. His grandfather, Archibald, has recently gone missing and he sees little of his parents. Daisy entertains Arthur with stories of his grandfather's adventures in Africa, featuring the tall Bogo Matassalai and the minuscule Minimoys, of whom the latter live in Archibald's garden, protecting a collection of rubies. Arthur becomes enamoured of a picture of Selenia, the princess of the Minimoys. When Daisy receives a two-day deadline to pay a large sum of money to a building developer named Ernest Davido, who plans to evict the two, Arthur looks for the rubies to pay off the debt, and discovers various clues left by his grandfather. He is met in the garden by the Bogo Matassalai, who reduces Arthur to Minimoy size. From the Minimoys, Arthur learns that they are in danger from Maltazard, a Minimoy war hero who rules the nearby 'Necropolis', after corruption by a weevil, by whom he has a son named Darkos.
Arthur, reflecting his legendary British namesake, draws a sacred sword from its recess and uses it to protect the Minimoys from Maltazard's soldiers; whereupon Sifrat, the ruler of the Minimoys, sends Arthur to Necropolis, with the princess Selenia and her brother Betameche. En route, they are attacked on two occasions by Maltazard's soldiers. In Necropolis, Selenia kisses Arthur, marking him as her husband and potential successor, and confronts Maltazard alone. When Maltazard learns that she has already kissed Arthur and thus can no longer give him her powers and cure his corruption, he imprisons all three, who discover a Minimoy form of Archibald. Thereafter, Arthur and his grandfather escape and return to human form, with little time to spare before Maltazard's flood reaches the Minimoys. With the help of Mino, a royal advisor's long-lost son, Arthur redirects the flood to Necropolis; whereupon Maltazard abandons Necropolis and his son, and the water ejects the rubies above ground. Archibald pays Davido with one ruby; and when he tries to take them all, the Bogo Matassalai capture him and give him to the authorities (scene deleted in the U.S. edition). The film ends with Arthur asking Selenia to wait for his return, and her agreement to do so.
Cast[]
- Freddie Highmore as Arthur Montogomery, Francis and Rose's son, Archibald and Daisy's grandson.
- Madonna as Princess Selenia, the eldest child and daughter of Emperor Sifrat, Betameche's older sister.
- Jimmy Fallon as Prince Betameche, the youngest child and son of Emperor Sifrat, Selenia's younger brother.
- Mia Farrow as Daisy, Arthur's long-suffering grandmother, Rose's mother, Archibald's wife, Francis' mother-in-law.
- Ron Crawford as Archibald, Arthur's grandfather, known to the Minimoys as Archibald the Benevolent, Daisy's husband, Rose's father, Francis' father-in-law.
- David Bowie as Emperor Maltazard (also known as the Evil M, Maltazard the Evil, or Malthazar the Cursed), antagonist. Although the film refers to him as Malthazar, his name in the book was Malthazard and some film versions refer to him as Maltazard. He is Darkos' father.
- Jason Bateman as Prince Darkos, Maltazard's vicious, but dim-witted son.
- Robert De Niro as Emperor Sifrat XVI, Betameche and Selenia's father.
- Adam LeFevre as Ernest Davido, a greedy landowner who presides over and founded the multi-national Davido Corporation, which specializes in property development.
- Snoop Dogg as Max, the leader of the Koolamassai, a race of beings similar to the Minimoys, who supply Maltazard's people with a 'candy fruit' and are therefore left relatively free.
- Penny Balfour as Rosie Suchot, Arthur's mother, Archibald and Daisy's daughter.
- Doug Rand as Francis, Arthur's father, Archibald and Daisy's son-in-law.
- Chazz Palminteri as Travel Agent.
- Harvey Keitel as Miro, the royal advisor.
- Erik Per Sullivan as Mino, Miro's son.
- Anthony Anderson as Koolamassai.
- Emilio Estevez as Ferryman.
Production[]
The animation was done by the French company BUF Compagnie, which hired approximately 100 animators, most of them from French animation schools and without any previous experience. Besson wanted a photorealistic environment, and BUF initially used microlenses to film physical environments, but eventually instead used photogrammetry, where a digitized photograph of a real object is manipulated with a computer. Sets were built to 1:3 scale, which allowed the animators to use natural elements, such as plants and grass. While the film did not use motion capture, real actors were used as reference, and recorded with 13 to 14 video cameras, but without the markers used in motion capture. Besson directed their performances. In terms of lip sync with actors' dialog, the French animators could not cope with the English phonemes. For Madonna and David Bowie, a camera was used to record their lips to help the animators. The animation was done with proprietary software.
Reception[]
The film was budgeted at $85 million. In its first two weeks in cinemas in France Arthur earned over US$20 million. Arthur and the Invisibles received negative reviews from film critics. In the United States, the movie's Los Angeles run garnered 21% positive reviews at the critic review aggregate site RottenTomatoes.com. The critic's census reads, "Arthur wastes its big-name voice talent on a predictable script and substandard CG animation. Los Angeles Times reviewer Alex Chun wrote that, "Director Luc Besson admits he knew nothing about animation before he started this project, and it shows". Variety's Robert Koehler called it "alienating and dislikable" and specifically noted that, "Having African-American thesps Snoop Dogg and Anthony Anderson voice creatures that are basically humanoid monkeys shows poor taste. Many found it derivative of sources ranging from King Arthur's sword-in-the-stone to the films The Dark Crystal and The Ant Bully, which itself was based on a children's book written three years before Besson's. "It all simply looks as if [conceptual artist Patrice] Garcia and Besson couldn't decide on any one thing to copy," said Frank Lovece of Film Journal International, "so they copied them all. Lovece also noted that, "the whole thing gets seriously creepy when [the animated versions of] the grown-up, pinup-beauty princess and the 10-year-old boy fall for each other. Mary Kay Letourneau comes uncomfortably to mind." Common Sense Media disliked the film, giving it 2 stars out of 5 and saying, "Uneven animation-live action combo may bore kids. Josh Tyler of Cinema Blend greatly disliked the film, giving it 1.5 stars out of 5 and saying, "Sure it has sometimes loved French director Luc Besson’s name on it, but the character designs look like they were stolen from those wispy haired troll dolls that were popular for about five minutes fifteen years ago, and the plot sounded like it was written by a ten-year-old kid underneath a heavy bedspread with a big chief tablet and a pencil the size of a horse’s leg. Besson, in a May 2007 interview, blamed American distributor The Weinstein Company for the film's poor critical reception in the U.S., saying "Why the critics didn't like Arthur was because [Weinstein] changed so much of the film and tried to pretend the film was American. [...] America and the UK were the only countries where the films were changed. The rest of the world has the same film as France."