Vibrant color and fluid hand-drawn lines mark the animation in this French-made caper, which earned an Oscar nomination for best animated feature.
The title character is Dino, a feline who leads a double life: By day, he's the pampered pet of Zoe, a mute girl whose mother, Jeanne, is the overworked police commissioner; by night, he's the accomplice to Nico, a kind-hearted cat burglar who's the target of Jeanne's current investigation.
When Zoe follows Dino one night, she discovers her cat's criminal sideline. Zoe soon becomes a prisoner of the gangster Victor Costa and his bumbling thugs, and it's up to Nico and Dino to rescue her.
Directors Alain Gagnol and Jean-Loup Felicioli create a great-looking movie, especially in the liquidlike movements of Nico and Dino and the splashes of color that make up Zoe's Paris. The screenplay, by Gagnol and producer Jacques-Rémy Girerd, falls into some familiar cop-movie clichés which are more pronounced in the weak English-language dubbing employed for the film's U.S. release.
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'A Cat in Paris'
Opens Friday, July 27, at the Tower Theatre; rated PG for mild violence and action, and some thematic material; 70 minutes. For more movie reviews, visit nowsaltlake.com/movies.