‘The Illusionist’ mesmerizes with little dialogue

French director Sylvain Chomet’s exquisitely animated film “The Illusionist” moves forward brilliantly — and almost completely without dialogue. “The Illusionist”

Starring Jean-Claude Donda, Eilidh Rankin and Duncan MacNeil

Directed by Sylvain Chomet

Grade: A

French director Sylvain Chomet’s exquisitely animated film “The Illusionist” moves forward brilliantly  — and almost completely without dialogue.

When the movie’s characters do communicate audibly, they do so through grunts, sighs and other crude noises. Most of the communication during the 80-minute film is visual, operating through the characters’ demeanors, expressions and gesticulations.

Nonetheless, the director of “The Triplets of Belleville” manages to convey the characters’ thoughts and emotions poignantly and precisely, giving us enough information to understand the events that transpire.

Originally written but unproduced in 1956 by the French film legend Jacques Tati, who died in 1982, “The Illusionist” tells the story of a washed-up magician who travels from one dilapidated theater to the next performing his craft.

When a whimsical Scottish drunk hires him to perform in a town that is only now celebrating its first electric light bulb, the magician encounters a young, naive housemaid. It is likely that the housemaid genuinely believes in his magic. When he produces a brand-new pair of shoes in front of her — seemingly by magic — she decides that he ought to be her new caretaker. Either too kind or too proud to confess to the girl that his magic is not real, the magician continues to conjure expensive clothes for the girl until he can afford it no more.

Chomet is a master animator, and he uses every advantage that his medium offers. His images are highly detailed — each communicates to the audience through color, light, perspective and the physical shapes of the characters.

Every character is an embodiment of his or her personality. The magician is drawn to resemble Tati, yet his every line emanates sadness and nostalgia. Some of the characters’ features are exaggerated; others are strategically reduced. At one point in the film, a bunch of showgirls walk by the magician’s dressing room. The women are about 70 percent leg and 15 percent feathery headdress.

“The Illusionist” addresses the decline of a form of entertainment. The magician is not the only Vaudevillian stage performer who is down on his luck. At a cheap hotel, we meet a clown, a puppet master and a band of upbeat trapeze artists who are also struggling to preserve their occupations. They are the last vestiges of a culture that appreciated a set of performers who did not depend on technology or sexuality to entertain.

Subtly and compassionately, the film demonstrates how the vicissitudes of modern culture have created a world that often forgets its idols just as quickly as it invents them.

“The Illusionist” is a graceful piece of art. It will play at Regent Square beginning Friday and also at Destitna Chartiers Valley, Destina Plaza East and AMC Loews Waterfront. Those who live in the suburbs probably will not get a chance to see the film, yet it is a movie that deserves to be seen — if only for its novelty.