The Illusionist: trailer preview

Watch the trailer for Sylvain Chomet's long-awaited follow-up to 'Belleville Rendez-vouz'

In our report from this year's Edinburgh Film Festival , Trevor Johnston noted that the quality of many of the new movies that made it to the line-up ranged from the disappointing to the downright disastrous. This was down, in no small part, to a barnstorming opening night film that set the bar obscenely high: Sylvain Chomet's ‘The Illusionist’ is the director's long, long, long-awaited follow-up to his eccentric Francophile charmer, ‘Belleville Rendez-vouz’, and is based on a script from one of France's greatest director-performers, Jacques Tati.



The film, which is released in UK cinemas on 20 August, follows a fumbling magician and his lovable stage sidekick (a hulking, mischievous white rabbit) as they tour their outmoded act around through the theatres of Europe, on to London and then finally up to Edinburgh. On his travels, the world-weary showman befriends a young girl from the countryside who he takes under his wing and subsequently introduces her to the responsibilities of adulthood.

Unlike the wham-bam box office behemoths from Pixar and Dreamworks, Chomet’s film captures and sustains a beautifully elegiac tone without relying on a stream of postmodern wisecracks to keep things 'fun'. It also showcases some of the most detailed and geographically precise hand-drawn landscapes that stand up to even Studio Ghibli's finest works. Below is the trailer for the film to whet your appetite: tell us what you think at the bottom.



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