April and the Extraordinary World

In a world where scientists have been disappearing one by one, France in 1941 still runs on steam: no electricity, no oil, a sky full of coal smoke. April's parents were among the vanished, and she carries on their work on a serum of immortality alone. Her talking cat Darwin is with her. The police are after her. The film is not interested in the game of alternate history. It is interested in who holds knowledge: its subject is not invention but the abduction of inventors, and the answer at the end is not a human conspiracy. The form is comics: Jacques Tardi's heavy-outlined, dirty-coloured design carried straight onto the screen, with a Paris of cable cars, smoke and two Eiffel Towers. Christian Desmares and Franck Ekinci directed, from Tardi's graphic novel, with Tardi contributing to the design. The film had its world premiere at the Annecy animation festival in 2015 and won the Cristal for best feature. It is a French, Canadian and Belgian co-production. Marion Cotillard voices April, with Jean Rochefort in the cast. Who it is for: viewers who like hand-drawn animation and steam-age alternate history. Who it is not for: anyone expecting fast adventure. The film spends a great deal of time building its world and its final explanation will strike some as too easy.