Since its debut 151 years ago, Georges Bizet’s enduring and controversial opera Carmen has inspired dozens of adaptations across mediums as varied as film, broadway, ballet, and even Olympic figure skating. Itself an adaptation of a novella by Prosper Mérimée, artists from around the world continue to mine Carmen’s themes of destiny, jealousy, and doomed love — ideas that make sense for adult-driven feature films but aren’t immediately obvious for an animated film told through the eyes of a group of children.
Sébastien Laudenbach, who co-directed 2023’s charming Chicken for Linda!, embraces this challenge with narrative and aesthetic brio. He simplifies Bizet’s story and shifts the perspective to a preteen-ish boy named Salva (Milo Machado-Graner of Anatomy of a Fall), the apprentice of an elderly, blind knife-sharpener named Tonio. The setting is still mid-19th century Seville (though the film is in French), but the audience now has a stand-in in the form of Salva, who’s moony-eyed over bold and beautiful Carmen (Camélia Jordana) but naive in the way of the world and ignorant to the pride, jealousy, and rage that drives older men to ruin.
Tonio, described as a “blind seer blade reader,” has ears as keen as his whetstone and is attuned to voices both human and metal. When he and Salva return to Seville after a long absence, a corporal named José asks to have his knife sharpened. As the blade flashes against the stone, Tonio sees an enraged bull and green-eyed Carmen, doomed to a violent death at the hands of José and his newly-sharpened blade. What follows is Salva’s quest to save Carmen from this fate. Joined by his friend Belén, a savvy petty thief who lives in an abandoned mine with a gaggle of street kids, they chase José across rooftops and alleys trying to outsmart the prophecy by stealing his knife.
Laudenbach was already known for his gorgeously impressionistic and evocative animation style, but here the results are simply breathtaking. Working alongside Élodie Rémy (colors) and Éléa Gobbé-Mévellec (character design), Viva Carmen is awash in vibrant, almost kaleidoscopic swirls of brushstrokes and color fields. Nearly every frame is bifurcated in shadow, creating a chiaroscuro effect that adds depth to the visual storytelling. Opaline slivers of moonlight are as vivid as the rays of a hot-pink sunset, and whenever Tonio sharpens a blade, the metal gleams a bright radioactive green — the same color as Carmen’s eyes. There’s no shortage of stunning moments, like the dapple of leaves across Salva’s body as he walks through the forest or the way he and a ferryman emerge all at once from the shores of a misty river, their bodies outlined in quivering vermilion brushstrokes.
As befits an adaptation of an opera, the film’s music is also outstanding. Composed by Amine Bouhafa and Isabelle Laudenbach, the director’s sister and an accomplished flamenco guitarist, the score incorporates the source material’s most well-known songs without overpowering the narrative flow. Non-opera fans will enjoy the moments of musical release, including a wonderful nighttime sequence that feels almost like a séance. Meanwhile, opera fans will get to experience these familiar songs in an entirely new setting. Carmen’s most famous accessory, her castanets, punctuate the film like chimes and lend the action an understated sun-kissed flair.
Despite Salva’s youthful naivete and his and Belén’s dogged efforts, Carmen can’t be saved. José’s jealousy was preordained, his knife sharpened past the point of no return. But what Carmen left behind — Salva and Belén and the community of women who loved her — lives on. This is especially true for Belén, older and wiser than Salva but no less vulnerable, who creates a sort of commune for Seville’s disenfranchised women. Part mother figure, part community organizer, part steward of Carmen’s memory, her own legacy will be one of creation and ingenuity, resourcefulness, and, above all, hope.
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