Les enfants de Timpelbach (2008)

The children of a small European mountain village end up being its only residents, soon after the adults cannot take their behavior any longer.

Director:

Nicolas Bary

Writers:

Nicolas Bary, Nicolas Peufaillit,

Stars:

Raphaël Katz, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Léo Legrand

1 nomination.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Raphaël Katz	...	Manfred
Adèle Exarchopoulos	...	Marianne
Léo Legrand	...	Thomas
Baptiste Bétoulaud	...	Oscar Le Rouge
Martin Jobert	...	Willy Hak
Lola Créton	...	Mireille Stettner
Léo Paget	...	Robert Lapointe
Ilona Bachelier	...	Charlotte
Julien Dubois	...	Barnabé
Florian Goutiéras	...	P'tit Louis
Talina Boyaci	...	Zoé
Mathieu Donné	...	Gros Paul
Terry Edinval	...	Wolfgang
Jonathan Joss	...	Jean Krog
Tilly Mandelbrot	...	Erna

Storyline

Welcome to Timpelbach, a small, serene village. Well, not really that serene... Indeed, for several weeks, the children have been playing multiple practical jokes and nasty tricks. The victims are, of course, other children... but also, and most of all, the parents. Overwrought, they decide to leave the village for what they think will only be one day. But nothing happens as planned: on the way back, they are taken prisoner by a group of soldiers. In Timpelbach, the news of a village without parents makes Oscar and his gang of thugs happy! But that isn't the case of a few daredevils who decide to side with Manfred and Marianne to regain control of the village.

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Plot Keywords:

village | soldier | child protagonist | prison cell | prison | 

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Taglines:

A Noël, ça va être leur fête! (This Christmas, they're getting their comeuppance!)

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Genres:

Adventure | Family | Fantasy

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Details

Official Sites:

Pathé Distribution [fr] Scope Invest [be]

Country:

France Luxembourg

Language:

French

Release Date:

17 December 2008 (France)

Also Known As:

A Cidade das Crianças

Box Office

Budget:

€13,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Chapter 2, Luxanimation, Scope Pictures

Technical Specs

Runtime:

95 min 120 min (European Film Market)

Sound Mix:

DTS Dolby SR

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Nicolas Bary originally wanted to cast children with no prior acting experience, so as to get the most natural reactions on camera, but quickly backtracked when he realized that with so many kids in the cast, he should be able to rely on them if any problems were to arise.

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Crazy Credits

After the end credits, a child's voice says: "Bah, c'est déjà fini?" (In English: "It is already finished?")

User Reviews

Offensive in every way

How could anybody raise any money for this. Marketed as a Harry Potter/Jeunet ripoff, that piece of garbage goes out of its way to steal from any source of successful and/or creative popular material, only doing it wrong in an unimaginative, exploitative attempt to cash on people's (and especially children's) stupidity.

Nobody is spared, Grinn, J.K.Rowling, Del Toro, Burton, S.King, W.Golding... and a copious amount of French references, with Goscigny and Jeunet being the most obvious.

Modern and politically correct winks are included of course, the single cool and integrated black kid shows up when needed, pop culture references, and so on.

Any attempt at originality is ill-advised, if not completely, utterly sick.

CGI is everywhere it shouldn't be. Many visuals are good, but many times unnecessary CGI elements are shouting "look at me ! I'm a process" on the screen. Like a phony print on a building, things like that.

Needless to say, any decent performance (by the kids) gets drowned with the boat.

The whole mess feels like a cheap, unlicensed, toxic copy of a plastic smurf village set.