PHANTOM BOY (Jean-Loup Felicioli, Alain Gagnol). Subtitled. 84 minutes. Opens Friday (July 29). See listing. Rating: NNN
Jean-Loup Felicioli and Alain Gagnol, creators of the Oscar-nominated A Cat In Paris, continue to carve out their niche in hand-drawn whimsy with Phantom Boy.
The new film is a pleasant if entirely undemanding animated adventure about a sick kid (voiced by Gaspard Gagnol) whose secret ability to leave his body and travel around invisibly proves essential to helping an injured cop (Edouard Baer) and an intrepid -reporter (Audrey Tautou) defeat a madman threatening to cripple the city with a computer virus.
As in Felicioli and Gagnol’s last film, the plot doesn’t feel entirely watertight and the whimsy can be a bit much – especially since this very French film insists that it’s taking place in New York City – but the visuals are charming and the character work is nicely idiosyncratic.
Although an English dub track exists, TIFF is screening the original, subtitled French version. Parents of younger children should come prepared to help their kids keep up.
