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| The mockingbird introduces himself to the young lovers. |
Also Released As: The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep, The King and Mr. Bird, The Curious Adventures of Mr. Wonderbird.
Release Date: Sept. 1952; March 19, 1980 (completed). Running Time: 63 minutes (1952)/84 minutes. Screenplay: Paul Grimault, Jacques Prèvert. Based on the story, The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep, by: Hans Christian Andersen. Producer: Andrè Sarrut, Robert Dorfmann. Director: Paul Grimault.
Version Reviewed: 2003 restored version, French with English subtitles (primary); 1952 version, English (reference).
THE PLOT:
The Kingdom of Tachycardia is ruled over by the tyrannical King Charles V + III = VIII + VIII = XVI. The king is vain and cruel, basking in the toadying of his subjects and then capriciously activating traps that consign them to fates that are unknown but certainly unpleasant. This includes the artist who has painted his most recent portrait. A press of a button consigns the unfortunate young man to the depths, while the portrait gains a place of honor in the king's private apartment.
That night, the king's various artworks come to life. A painted chimney sweep and shepherd girl hold hands across their respective picture frames. But the king's likeness was captured too well, and his portrait sneers as he insists that he will marry the shepherdess. The boy and girl escape their 2-dimensional existence and escape, prompting the painted king to do the same - deposing the real monarch so that he can turn all the resources of the kingdom toward one goal: the capture of the shepherdess and the chimney sweep!
The young couple finds an ally in the form of the mockingbird, a confident patriarch who is able to talk and think his way out of trouble and who bears a grudge against the king. With the bird's help, they manage to evade capture. But the chase brings them ever deeper into the king's citadel, a place laden with dangers...
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| The tyrannical King Charles is deposed by his own painting! |
CHARACTERS:
Mockingbird: King Charles, a self-styled hunter (whose servants do all his actual hunting), was responsible for the death of his beloved wife. As a result, he despises the monarch, taunting and mocking him at every opportunity. He has by far the most dialogue of any character, as he's a fast talker able to calm the lovers' rattled nerves, heckle the king, and even rally allies. In the 1980 release, which is the basis of this review, Jean Martin provides the bird's voice. He's wonderful, deep-voiced and extravagant in a way that perfectly suits the character.
King Charles: As either human or painting, King Charles has zero redeeming qualities. The character art makes every piece of him slightly disproportionate in a way that emphasizes his depravity. He has giant ears, a long nose, a round and chinless face, a jutting stomach, and stubby legs. Meanwhile, thick lips turn his every smile into a malevolent sneer. His movements are comical, but his sadism is unmistakable: one second teasing his subjects with a hint of favor, and the next pressing a button or yanking a drawstring to send them plummeting to the depths.
Shepherdess/Chimney Sweep: The two young lovers, who are less active than acted upon. They earn the mockingbird's loyalty after the chimney sweep rescues one of his chicks from certain death, and the bird repays that favor repeatedly throughout the story. The two barely speak, mostly just clinging together and reacting to the various oddities and horrors within the citadel while attempting to escape the evil king's clutches.
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| A still from the tacked-on ending to the 1952 release. |
THE 1952 RELEASE AND ITS INFLUENCE ON GHIBLI:
This movie has been cited as an inspiration by both Isao Takahata and Hayao Miyazaki - but the version they saw was very different from director Paul Grimault's final release.
Grimault began production in 1948, but the animation fell behind schedule. When he was about 80% complete, the film was taken away from him by producer Andrè Sarrut, who released it in 1952 over Grimault's objections. This version was no disaster, winning the Special Jury Prize at the 1952 Venice Film Festival and earning a BAFTA nomination in 1958, and it's been cited as an influence by many animators of the time, including both Takahata and Miyazaki, as well as legendary Japanese animator Yasuo Ōtsuka.
Grimault regained the rights in 1967, and in 1980 he was able to complete his version. The story is mostly the same, but sequences are extended so that they can breathe, and the surreal visuals are on fuller display. Notable additions include: a sequence that introduces the factory where "voluntary workers" (prisoners) are sentenced to hard labor; a full introduction to the king's painting (the true villain of the piece); a new ending; and several scenes that have been re-animated so that the same actions happen in more visually interesting settings.
There are some visual mismatches between the original and new footage, notably involving a pride of captive lions. Still, as a movie to watch, I think the 1980 release is easily the superior one. The 1952 version is still a good film, though, and it's actually more significant because of its broad influence. Sadly, most prints of the original version were destroyed after Grimault gained control of the rights. The English dub was spared, as it had dropped into the public domain, and it can be viewed in its entirety on the Wikipedia page for The King and the Mockingbird... but it's in poor quality, with faded colors and visual instability.
It's still worth a look to see the actual film that inspired so many animators. It's actually a pretty good dub: Peter Ustinov provides the voice of the Mockingbird, and Max Adrian goes full ham as the evil king. I'm happy that Grimault was able to complete his masterpiece, and I think his version is the better... but the earlier version is still a worthy film, and an important one, and I'm strongly of the opinion that it should also be available in a high-quality release.
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| The king finally captures the heroes. The artwork throughout makes remarkable use of vertical space. |
ARTISTIC ACHIEVEMENT:
"We were formed by the films and filmmakers of the 1950s... It was through watching Le Roi et l’Oiseau by Paul Grimault that I understood how it was necessary to use space in a vertical manner."
-Hayao Miyazaki, Le Monde.
The King and the Mockingbird is an artistic achievement, a visual feast that works on multiple thematic levels as well as aesthetic ones.
Miyazaki made particular note about the use of vertical space - and the verticality is immediately apparent. The Kingdom of Tachycardia is essentially a single giant structure. Chambers hang off the sides of enormous pillars, not integrated into the architecture but rather existing like pustules around an infected sore. King Charles rides impossibly tall elevators to his private chambers at the very top. When he and his men are alerted that the chimney sweep and shepherdess have fled into the citadel, they give chase by hopping onto rafts, following a canal down a waterfall to descend the full height of their structure in seconds.
His apartment may be up high, but the king's true domain is below. The king disposes of inconvenient subjects by opening floor traps, sending them plummeting into the depths, and the only civilian population we see ekes out an existence underground. Meanwhile, his tormenter, the mockingbird, taunts him and makes his escape into the sky. The bird is only captured within the citadel, a seemingly endless labyrinth that offers no sky for escape, and which is home to peasants who associate birds with their salvation, but who don't actually know what birds look like.
The king's power is represented in large part through mechanization. The mockingbird flies and the young lovers run, clutching to each other for comfort. By contrast, the stubby-legged monarch barely even walks. He rides around on increasingly ridiculous-looking conveyances that Dr. Seuss might have created had he ever dabbled in steampunk.
After about the 20-minute mark, the king is replaced by his own portrait, making him a literal facsimile of a man... something that makes no actual difference to the story. The king was already soulless, and it seems appropriate that a man who is human in name only gets replaced by his own, two-dimensional reproduction.
This marriage of artistic technique and theme is likely one reason that Isao Takahata praised the movie for its "union between literature and animation." In a 2014 extract for the British Film Institute, Takahata would go further, discussing the serious, even political themes tucked beneath the film's visuals and humor and stating: "If I had not seen this film, I would have never imagined entering the world of animation."
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| The king's subterranean subjects are shocked by their ruler's final conveyance: a destructive giant robot! |
OTHER MUSINGS:
Lest I make this film sound like a depressingly "worthy" artifact to endure only in film or art classes, let me make one other thing very clear: The King and the Mockingbird is an extremely entertaining motion picture.
Grimault's visuals remain dazzling, and they are often quite funny. When a guard fails to bring the king the shepherdess and chimney sweep, the king makes a show of laughing. Then he rides his mobile throne out of the room, the door closing behind him - only to return a second later, fixing the guard with a glare and reaching slowly for the fatal button. At which point the guard dances around the room, evading the trap as if trying to steer clear of a targeting sight, in a scene that combines slapstick and dark humor to great effect.
The king and mockingbird are both dominant figures, one a small statured, sadistic tyrant, the other a colorful figure who talks fast and thinks faster. They lend energy to every scene in which they feature, and most scenes feature one or the other. The bird denounces the king in one of the movie's first scenes, labeling him a murderer. He then flies up to the monarch's apartment to torment him through the window.
Later, the mockingbird uses his wits to distract the guards while the shepherdess and chimney sweep escape the authorities' first attempt to capture them. He eventually rouses allies with a speech that appeals to their sympathies... but only after first using loaded sensory language to stir up their own interests.
The story is well-paced. The first third or so takes time to establish the characters, using a few long scenes to set up the kingdom and the characters. Once the pursuit begins, scenes become shorter and editing becomes faster. There's a small pause after a crisis point arrives, but then activity and editing become rapid and frenetic approaching the climax. The final sequence is expertly judged, as several individually absurd elements are brought together to bring the situation to its close.
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| The mockingbird mocks the monarch from atop his own statue. |
OVERALL:
The King and the Mockingbird is a joy to watch on a visual level, with Paul Grimault's art remaining impressive today. It's also expertly paced, often funny but with a thematic core that keeps it feeling substantial. It remains a fine film to watch, not only to appreciate its artistry, but also simply to enjoy.
Overall Rating: 10/10.
Next: An animated fable from the Soviet Union, one that Miyazaki has credited with keeping him from abandoning animation entirely...
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