Sightlines · reception
How The Triplets of Belleville was received
2003 · Sylvain Chomet · The Triplets of Belleville on Sightlines
The arc
An arthouse sensation from its Cannes 2003 debut, it became the rare foreign hand-drawn oddity to crash the Oscars with two nominations — and it's only grown in stature since, now routinely cited as proof that animation was never just for kids.
What’s debated
Fans still argue over its gleefully grotesque caricatures — is the satire of American excess (and some of its retro imagery) sharp cartooning or a step too far?
Its footprint
The earworm 'Belleville Rendez-vous' escaped the film entirely — an Oscar-nominated song from a nearly wordless cartoon — and Madame Souza, Bruno the dog, and those spindly cyclists remain instantly recognizable shorthand for a whole strain of European animation.
Where it stands
A fixture of the adult-animation canon and a Letterboxd darling — the 'you must see this' gateway drug to animation beyond Disney and Pixar.
Did you know? Despite having almost no dialogue, it scored two Oscar nominations — Best Animated Feature (losing to Finding Nemo) and Best Original Song for 'Belleville Rendez-vous'.
Named by the director
- Jacques Tati — Chomet has repeatedly cited Tati's near-wordless visual comedy as the film's guiding influence — he even puts a clip of Tati's Jour de fête on a TV screen in the movie, and later adapted Tati's unproduced script as The Illusionist.