The Triplets of Belleville
Metascore
91 out of 100

Universal acclaim - based on 35 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 34 out of 35
  2. Mixed: 1 out of 35
  3. Negative: 0 out of 35
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  1. Christian Science Monitor
    Reviewed by: David Sterritt
    100
    Children may enjoy it, aside from the youngest, who might find it too weird for comfort. Its main audience is adults, though. And not just any adults, but those in the mood for venturesome fare that's both surreal and hilarious.
  2. Miami Herald
    Reviewed by: Rene Rodriguez
    100
    The movie itself is a nominee for Best Animated Feature, and it's good enough to pull a surprise upset over the beloved Finding Nemo. It's a mad masterpiece.
  3. New York Daily News
    Reviewed by: Jami Bernard
    100
    An insanely delicious animated feature.
  4. New York Post
    Reviewed by: Lou Lumenick
    100
    Chomet's wacky tale is so crammed full of eye-popping images, it's impossible to forget afterward.
  5. Philadelphia Inquirer
    Reviewed by: Steven Rea
    100
    With a bit of Tintin and Tati, Charlie Chaplin and Wallace and Gromit echoing in the pacing and comic sensibility, Triplets of Belleville conjures up a world that's totally surprising and sublime.
  6. Boston Globe
    Reviewed by: Ty Burr
    100
    All you really need to enjoy "Triplets" is a taste for the weird and the wonderful.
  7. Baltimore Sun
    Reviewed by: Michael Sragow
    100
    A madcap milestone. Not since Disney's 75-minute Alice In Wonderland (1951) has an animator filled the screen with dazzling flights of random invention that manage to hook up into a swift, brief narrative.
  8. USA Today
    Reviewed by: Claudia Puig
    100
    Both a nostalgic throwback to the silent-picture era and an ultra-modern animated tale, the slyly humorous Triplets of Belleville is artful, engrossing and oddly touching.
  9. Film Threat
    Reviewed by: Rick Kisonak
    100
    Breathtakingly inventive story.
  10. Portland Oregonian
    Reviewed by: Shawn Levy
    100
    It is a pure, streamlined delight, the advent of a talent with no exact equal in modern film.
  11. New York Magazine (Vulture)
    Reviewed by: Peter Rainer
    100
    The most joyously cinematic movie I've seen this year. Chomet's astonishing imagination conjures images you could swear you've seen in your dreams.
  12. L.A. Weekly
    Reviewed by: Ella Taylor
    100
    This divinely eccentric movie feels as if it came straight to the screen from one man’s wild and wantonly free imagination.
  13. Village Voice
    Reviewed by: J. Hoberman
    100
    The year's most ingenious and original animated feature.
  14. Los Angeles Times
    Reviewed by: Kenneth Turan
    100
    Fast, funny, unexpected and uninhibited, The Triplets of Belleville may be animated, but it is also the product of an artistic vision every bit as rigorous as any lofty Cannes prize-winner. Hearing about a film this special isn't enough. It demands to be seen, and it generously rewards those who, like Madame Souza, let nothing stand in their way.
  15. Time
    Reviewed by: Richard Corliss
    100
    Triplettes is terrific…there's no competition for the fall's most imaginative delight. In that race, Triplettes can already take its victory lap.
  16. Entertainment Weekly
    Reviewed by: Lisa Schwarzbaum
    91
    If ''Finding Nemo'' is an awesome Pixar superpower, The Triplets of Belleville is a charming, idiosyncratic, self-governing duchy with huge tourism potential on the other side of the animated-movie planet.
  17. The A.V. Club
    Reviewed by: Noel Murray
    90
    The film is best treated as a one-of-a-kind wonder: an ingenious contraption that dazzles, teases, attracts, and repels with all the mystery and sublimity of a miniature world.
  18. Dallas Observer
    Reviewed by: Gregory Weinkauf
    90
    An animated extravaganza of Gallic wit and soul that delivers more wild humanity than many of the year's live-action features. In a word: go.
  19. The New York Times
    Reviewed by: Dana Stevens
    90
    May be the oddest movie of the year, by turns sweet and sinister, insouciant and grotesque, invitingly funny and forbiddingly dark. It may also be one of the best, a tour de force of ink-washed, crosshatched mischief and unlikely sublimity.
  20. Newsweek
    Reviewed by: David Ansen
    90
    A tad dark for little kids, this one-of-a-kind movie delivers 80 minutes of idiosyncratic inspiration.
  21. Washington Post
    Reviewed by: Ann Hornaday
    90
    Chomet's vision is singularly strange and somber, and one of enormous originality and promise.
  22. Chicago Reader
    Reviewed by: Ronnie Scheib
    90
    Sly, inventively drawn, brilliantly executed cartoon.
  23. Rolling Stone
    Reviewed by: Peter Travers
    88
    It's comic, touching and a visual knockout.
  24. Chicago Sun-Times
    Reviewed by: Roger Ebert
    88
    To call it weird would be a cowardly evasion. It is creepy, eccentric, eerie, flaky, freaky, funky, grotesque, inscrutable, kinky, kooky, magical, oddball, spooky, uncanny, uncouth and unearthly. Especially uncouth.
  25. The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
    Reviewed by: Rick Groen
    88
    Bizarre, indeed.
  26. Seattle Post-Intelligencer
    Reviewed by: William Arnold
    83
    Most of the magic of this unusual movie comes from the freshness, imagination and sweet spirit of its animation, which is blissfully its own thing and does not show the influence of any of the reigning forces in the art form.

User Reviews

All reviews »
User Score
7.9 out of 10

Generally favorable reviews- based on 134 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 59 out of 73
  2. Mixed: 6 out of 73
  3. Negative: 8 out of 73
  1. Harry
    10
    "The Triplets of Belleville" is one of the most charming, original and hilarious experiences I've ever had at a movie theater. It is a tribute to Silent movies but also a caricature of New York, Paris and Montreal. The animation simply tops anything Disney has ever made. How it didn't win best animated film at the Oscars is beyond me. This is one of the greats!… Full Review »
  2. AlexOldOne
    6
    There was little communication of warmth between mother and son. The son barely acknowledged her existence. Missing that emotional connection, I just couldn't fully connect to the film despite its great production levels… Full Review »
  3. NedRyerson1
    9
    The Triplets of Belleville is the film that made Sylvain Chomet famous. It is a quaint and old-fashion tale about a grandma and her dog looking for her grandson, a bicyclist that is kidnapped from The Tour of France by the local mafia. He is taken to Belleville, which is a sort of Sin City, a mix between New York and Las Vegas. There the old lady will meet the Triplets, that now a day are outdated and forgotten by show business.
    This movie with poor dialogues and expressionist graphics, reach high levels of concepts that want to transmit: the pauper environments have caught the characters and take away from them the possibility of dreaming; this characters have to survive by any way, because the show business has failed; the human beings are represented with characteristics of animals and things, because they live in a materialistic society and are what they truly demonstrate; gathering everything it can be said that there is no escape from the reality.
    The Triplets of Belleville is a strange, but hilarious film. The direction is unique, the art direction is beautiful and the music is overwhelming, the Belleville Rendez-Vous is one of the best movie themes of all times.    … Full Review »
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