Michel Ocelot


Michel Ocelot is a French screenwriter, designer, storyboard artist and director of animated films and television programs and a former president of the International Animated Film Association. Though best known for his 1998 debut feature Kirikou and the Sorceress, his earlier films and television work had already won Césars and British Academy Film Awards among others and he was made a chevalier of the Légion d'honneur on 23 October 2009, presented to him by Agnès Varda who had been promoted to commandeur earlier the same year. In 2015 he got the Lifetime Achievement Award at the World Festival of Animated Film – Animafest Zagreb.

Biography

Education and short films (1980s)

He was born in 1943 to a Catholic family then in Villefranche-sur-Mer, on the French Riviera, who relocated to Guinea, West Africa for much of his childhood, moving back to Anjou in France during his adolescence. As a teenager he played with and created toy theatre productions and was inspired to become an animator through viewing Hermína Týrlová's Vzpoura hraček and discovering a book on DIY stop motion animation. He was never formally taught animation, however, and instead studied the decorative arts, first at the Ecole régionale des Beaux-Arts in Angers, then the École nationale supérieure des arts décoratifs in Paris and the California Institute of the Arts in Los Angeles. He now lives and operates from an atelier-apartment in Paris.
In 1976, he created the series The Adventures of Gédéon, then his first professionally produced short film, The Three Inventors, was produced in 1979 by AAA. He received an award at the BAFTA that same year for this film in London.
In 1983, he won the César Award for Best Animated Short Film for The Legend of the Poor Hunchback, also produced by AAA.

Feature films and success (1990s–2000s)

In 1994, Michel Ocelot was elected president of the International Animated Film Association for two terms.
His œuvre is characterised by having worked in a variety of animation techniques, typically employing a different medium for each new project, but almost exclusively within the genres of fairy tales and fairytale fantasy. Some, such as Kirikou and the Sorceress, are loose adaptations of existing folk tales, others are original stories constructed from the "building blocks" of such tales. He describes the process as "I play with balls that innumerable jugglers have already used for countless centuries. These balls, passed down from hand to hand, are not new. But today I'm the one doing the juggling." Visually, they are characterised by a rigid use, excepting brief transitions between them, of the side-on, straight-on and ¾ viewpoints TF1 INFO – Actualités du jour en direct : Actualité en France et à l'International of silhouette and cutout animation even when working in mediums which allow for greater flexibility and dynamic viewpoints. Though often likened to Reiniger, he himself finds her films "rather archaic and not very attractive" and does not list them among his favourites. He also admires the art of ancient Egypt, pottery of ancient Greece, Hokusai and illustrators such as Arthur Rackham, W. Heath Robinson and his brothers and, most of all, Aubrey Beardsley. He was president of the Association international du film d'animation from 1994 to 2000.
To celebrate "World Animation Day," Michel Ocelot participated on 28 in a special day on animation techniques at the Forum des Images, in Paris, to conclude the "Animation Film Festival". He demonstrated the simplicity of his techniques live.
While already a household name in much of continental Europe, and greatly respected by Studio Ghibli's Isao Takahata, his success in the more conservative markets of the United Kingdom, United States and Germany has been restricted by a mixed reaction to the realistic and non-sexual, but nevertheless omnipresent nudity in his breakout film Kirikou and the Sorceress. Although all of these countries' boards of film classification have approved it as being suitable for all ages, cinemas and TV channels have been reluctant to show it due to the possible backlash from offended parents. In 2007, he gained some further recognition within the English-speaking world by directing a music video for the Icelandic musician Björk, the lead single from her album Volta.
In another 2008 interview he mentioned as further examples of favourite and influential artistic works Voltaire's letters, The Heron and the Crane, Crac, Father and Daughter, the first part of Grand Illusion, Neighbors, the Eiffel Tower, Millesgården, Persian miniatures, Jean Giraud's free drawing and illustrations by Kay Nielsen.

Recognition (2010s)

In 2008, he was awarded an international prize, the Klingsor Award at the Bratislava Animation Biennale.
Two years later, he created the animated fantasy series Dragons and Princesses for the television channel Canal+ Family, which employs the cut-out paper technique from Princes and Princesses. The following year, he adapted these 10 episodes into a feature film titled Tales [of the Night (film)|Tales of the Night]. The film attracted only about 500000 amissions but received several nominations at the 2011 Berlinale. In addition, the Henri-Langlois Prize for Animated Film and Moving Image was awarded to him in that same year for his entire body of work.
File:Michel_Ocelot_2018.jpg|thumb|Michel Ocelot at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival 2018 for the premiere of Dilili in Paris.
The following year, he concluded his trilogy with Kirikou and the Men and Women. As the title suggests, this time the author focuses on telling stories of villagers rather than animals, as in the second installment. Technically, the filmmaker complemented 2D animation with 3D cinema technology. This project was originally conceived as a six-episode animated series for France Télévisions.
At the end of 2018, he unveiled his fifth animated feature, Dilili in Paris, which tells the adventures of a young Franco-Kanak girl in Paris during the Belle Époque. While the filmmaker has fun depicting a visually imagined Paris, with the heroine encountering prominent figures of the time, he also confronts serious and realistic themes, discussing colonialism and racism. The film gathered more than 600000 viewers and won the César Award for Best Animated Feature in 2019.

Filmography

YearTitle FormatMediumOther notes
1974Le Tabac 1 min short film
1976Gideon
60 × 5 min TV seriesCut-out animationBased on the comics by Benjamin Rabier
1979Les 3 Inventeurs
13 min short filmCut-out animationBest animated short at the 34th British Academy Film Awards, 1980Zagreb World Festival of Animated Films and 1981 Odense Film Festival
Extract featured in the "Globe Trotting" segment of the 2003 documentary The Animated Century
1981Daughters of Equality
1 min short filmTraditional animationSpecial jury prize at the 1982 Albi Film Festival
1982Beyond Oil20 min educational filmCut-out animationAnimated segments only; live action directed by Philippe Vallois
Full transfer from production company aaa
1982The Legend of the Poor Hunchback
7 min short filmAnimaticBest animated short at the César Awards">César Award">César Awards
1983La Princesse insensible
13 × 4 min TV series Mixed
1987Les Quatre Vœux du Vilain et de sa femme
5 min short filmTraditional animationFeatured in the 1989 package film Outrageous Animation compiled and distributed in cinemas and on home video in North America by Expanded Cinema
1989Ciné si8 × 12 min TV seriesMixed silhouette animationBest TV series episode at the 1990 Ottawa International Animation Festival and 1991 Annecy Festival 1991
Compiled into Princes and Princesses
1992Les Contes de la nuit
26 min TV specialMixed silhouette animationContains "La Belle Fille et le sorcier", "Bergère qui danse" and "Le Prince des joyaux"
1998Kirikou and the Sorceress
71 min feature filmDigital traditional animationBest animated feature at the 1999 Annecy Festival; best European feature at the 2002 British Animation Awards
2000Princes and Princesses
70 min feature filmMixed silhouette animationCompilation movie of Ciné si
2005Kirikou and the Wild Beasts
75 min feature filmDigital traditional animationCo-directed with Bénédicte Galup
2006Azur & Asmar
90 min feature filmComputer animationBest animated feature at the 2007 Zagreb World Festival of Animated Films
Also serves as voice director for the English version
2007"Earth Intruders"4 min music video for BjörkMixed live action and animationNominated for best video at the 2007 Q Awards
2007Kirikou et Karaba
PlayMusical theatre
2008L'Invité aux noces
Original video shortAnimatic
2010Dragons et Princesses
10 × 13 min TV series for Canal+Computer silhouette animationSpecial award for a TV series at the 2010 Annecy Festival
Compiled into Tales of the Night and Ivan Tsarevitch and the Changing Princess
2011Tales of the Night
84 min feature filmComputer silhouette animationCompilation movie of Dragons et Princesses
Premiered in competition for the Golden Bear at the 61st Berlin International Film Festival; played in competition at the 2011 Sitges Film Festival
2012Kirikou and the Men and Women
88 min feature filmComputer animation
2016Ivan Tsarevitch and the Changing Princess
53 min feature filmComputer silhouette animationCompilation movie of Dragons et Princesses
2018Dilili in Paris Feature filmComputer animation
2022Le Pharaon, le Sauvage et la PrincesseFeature filmComputer animation

Distinctions

Awards