Producer: Peter McCown   Director: Sean Charmatz  Screenplay: Charlie Kaufman   Cast: Jacob Tremblay, Paul Walter Hauser, Colin Hanks, Angela Bassett, Mia Akemi Brown, Natasia Demetriou, Nat Faxon, Golda Rosheuvel, Aparna Nancheria, Ike Barinholtz, Matt Dellapina, Carla Gugino, Shannon Chan-Kent, Shino Nakamichi, Ren Hanami, Jack Fisher, Nick Kishiyama and Werner Herzog   Distributor: Netflix

Grade:  B+

Charlie Kaufman, master of bizarre cinematic fables for adults, might not seem an obvious choice to pen an animated family movie, but his adaptation—or more properly expansion—of Emma Yarlett’s 2014 illustrated children’s book proves a delight that will appeal to viewers of all ages.  Made with DreamWorks Animation’s customary efficiency (the production designer was Tim Lamb), smartly paced by director Sean Charmatz and editor Kevin Sukho Lee, and featuring a stellar voice cast and a bouncy score by Kevin Lax and Robert Lydecker, “Orion and the Dark” embeds a typically Kaufmanesque obsession with existential questions, along with some sharp satiric jabs aimed at older viewers, in a jovial, kid-friendly parable that also exalts the power of story-telling.

The basic thrust of the movie is the importance of overcoming one’s childhood fears.  Orion (voiced by Jacob Tremblay) is afflicted with pantophobia; as he tells us, and records in his ever-present notebook, he’s anxious about virtually everything, imagining the most unlikely scenarios to justify the feeling—as well as being concerned, not without justification, about being bullied by his locker-room nemesis Richi Panichi (Jack Fisher).  His parents (Matt Dellapina and Carla Gugino), who he believes might simply move out while he’s off at school, try to reassure him, but it doesn’t help.

One night Dark (Paul Walker Hauser) comes out of the closet, as it were, to confront Orion as the boy shivers in terror; he’s a huge figure in a black hooded cloak, looking rather like Christmas to Come.  But far from being silent, he’s a voluble fellow.  All kids are afraid of the dark, he says, but Orion is the worst.  He first tries to woo the kid with a film he’s made about himself, an ultra-short piece narrated by Werner Herzog, with titles by Saul Bass—don’t expect your young’uns to get those jokes, let alone Dark’s complaints about the thing not being accepted at Sundance. Then he makes a suggestion: maybe if Orion accompanied him on his journey around the world and met his nocturnal associates, the experience would cure him of his unreasoning fear.  Orion’s resistant, but it’s no use.  Soon they’re off. 

Thus is the boy introduced to Dark’s comrades: on one side Quiet (Aparna Nancheria), Sleep (Natasia Demetriou) and Sweet Dreams (Angela Bassett), and on the other Unexplained Noises (Golda Rosheuvel) and Insomnia (Nat Faxon).  Together they traverse the globe each night, speedily proceeding—with occasional breaks—while Light (Ike Barinholtz) follows after them, bringing the day in his wake.

The movie depicts each of these figures cleverly in terms of their appearances, and though Light is a fairly one-note character, Dark’s comrades are all given amusing personalities, and plenty of cheeky dialogue as well.  (Quiet’s has to be subtitled, because it’s all whispered.)  Simply put, they’re fun to spend time with, and Orion benefits from their company.  But the experience of the journey isn’t all rosy: Dark begins to doubt himself and withdraws from his job, depressed.  That leads to a realization of what life would be like in constant, blazing sunshine, and Dark must be wooed back into service.

But there’s a further complication in that the story, it’s revealed, is a bedtime yarn being spun by the grown-up Orion (Colin Hands) for his daughter Hypatia (Mia Akemi Brown), who’s afraid of the dark too.  Father and daughter will collaborate in figuring out how to fix the road bump in his tale, which will involve the girl actually travelling back in time to assist in kid Orion’s journey; and when their work is done, getting her back to her own era will necessitate an intervention by a boy named Tycho (Nick Kishiyama) who pilots a time-travel device.  There’ll also be a further shift forward to a scene with a grown-up Hypatia (Shannon Chan-Kent) and a grandfatherly Orion.

All this might seem overly busy and cumbersome, but it shares the DNA of Pixar movies that have delved into the human psyche, and it’s delivered quite smoothly—and entertainingly, with the kind of colorful energy kids will embrace and lots of humor their parents and grandparents will appreciate.  Little Orion, for example, is an extremely precocious child whose remarks seem much too mature for his age, but they make perfect sense when you realize they’re words put into his mouth by his older self, who’s narrating the tale (and by extension, by Kaufman, who’s implanting his own reflections on life into the lines).  The time-travel segue in the final act comes across as rather gilding the lily, but children will love it.

Netflix has been the target of a lot of criticism—rightfully in regard to its often bombastic or unfunny live-action movies—but in its defense it’s provided the opportunity for animators to shine.  It’s supported Aardman Studios–the recent “Chicken Run” sequel was a winner–and though they weren’t strictly speaking animated, Wes Anderson’s trio of Roald Dahl stories, with their characteristically artificial backgrounds, were stunning.  Now the streamer has given apparent free rein to Kaufman, first with the adult-minded “I’m Thinking of Ending Things” and now with this delicious family fable. “Orion and the Dark” is a film that’s worthy of comparison to Tim Burton’s “The Nightmare Before Christmas” as well as the more ambitious Pixar product like “Inside Out” and “Soul.”  It’s so good it almost makes you forgive dross like “The Gray Man.”                               

Producers: Éric Altmayer and Nicolas Altmayer   Director: François Ozon   Screenplay: François Ozon and Philippe Piazzo   Cast: Nadia Tereszkiewicz, Rebecca Marder, Isabelle Huppert, Fabrice Luchini, Dany Boon, André Dussollier, Édouard Sulpice, Régis Laspalès, Olivier Broche, Félix Lefebvre, Franck de Lapersonne, Evelyne Buyle, Michel Fau, Daniel Prévost, Myriam Boyer, Jean-Christophe Bouvet, Suzanne de Baecque, Lucia Sanchez and Jean-Claude Bolle-Reddat   Distributor: Music Box Films

Grade: B+

Prolific writer-director François Ozon refuses to be pigeonholed, moving smoothly between serious films like “Everything Went Fine” and frothy fare like this fizzing take on Georges Berr and Louis Verneuil’s vintage 1934 play, which previously inspired two Hollywood pictures, ”True Confession” (1937) with Carole Lombard and “Cross My Heart” (1946) with Betty Hutton.  It’s as loose an adaptation as either of them but superior to both, and isn’t just a throwback screwball comedy, adding some cheeky feminist notes to the nutty plot as a modern sauce to the archaic plot while dressing the entire thing in elegantly over-the-top finery redolent of an earlier age—Jean Rabasse’s production design and Pascaline Chavanne’s costumes are riotously colorful, in the presumed style of the stage original recalled in the curtain that rises at the very start, and Manu Dacosse’s lustrous cinematography italicizes the artifice.)     

Nadia Tereszkiewicz and Rebecca Marder star as Madeleine Verdier and Pauline Mauléon, young women sharing a flat in 1935 Paris.  Madeleine is an aspiring actress and Pauline a recently-minted lawyer, but neither is bringing in any money, and they’re far behind in their rent; their landlord (Franck De Lapersonne) threatens to evict them, and their concierge (Myriam Boyer) would certainly not object.

Madeleine is despondent, even threatening suicide, because of her disappointment that a meeting with powerful producer Montferrand (Jean-Christophe Bouvet) failed to bring the offer of a big role in his new play she’d expected.  Instead he suggested a minor part along with a major one as his mistress, leading her to flee in disgust and rush home, pushing past pedestrians on the way.  To make matters worse, her handsome lover Bonnard (Édouard Sulpice), who’s allergic to the idea of work, arrives with the news that his father (André Dussollier) is arranging a marriage for him with a woman whose father will invest heavily in the family’s financially troubled tire company; the supposed good news is that the proposed bride is homely, and so his relationship with Madeleine can continue with her as his mistress.    

The roommates’ back-and-forth is interrupted by a police investigator (Régis Laspalès) who informs them that Montferrand was found shot to death just after Madeleine left him in a huff.  When he learns that money had disappeared from the producer’s mansion and discovers a gun in the girls’ flat, he proposes to the buffoonish judge Rabusset (Fabrice Luchini) that he charge Madeleine with murder, despite the misgivings of the judge’s squirrely clerk Trapu (Olivier Broche).

When Rabusset, anxious to burnish his reputation for failure, does bring the charge, Rebecca, acting as Madeleine’s lawyer, encourages her to confess to the crime, though she’s innocent.  She’ll argue that Madeleine acted in self-defense when Montferrand attacked her, and a victory in court will help both their careers.  The trial becomes a cause célèbre in which both women play their roles to the hilt and the misogynistic tirades of the pompous prosecutor (Michel Fau) play into their hands.  The result Is a triumph for both Madeleine, who becomes an immediate sensation on stage and screen, and Rebecca, now a star advocate.

But there’s a fly in the ointment.  Flamboyant has-been actress Odette Chaumette (Isabelle Huppert}—whom astute viewers will remember having glimpsed briefly in an early scene—shows up with a claim that threatens to undermine the outcome of the trial, which has proven strangely satisfactory to both sides.  Only the intervention of Fernand Palmarède (Dany Boon), a wealthy architect who’d been a business partner of Montferrand’s, saves everyone’s bacon, and even Madeleine’s hoped-for marriage to the younger Bonnard.

All of this is giddy nonsense, but it’s staged with zip by Ozon and editor Laure Gardette, using old tropes like sweeps, montages of newspaper headlines and black-and-white film inserts for period effect, the visuals accompanied by a score from Philippe Rombi that misses the sinister and the bouncy with a dollop of old Hollywood schmaltz.  Tereszkiewicz and Marder make a fine central pair, the former’s blonde bombshell complemented beautifully by the latter’s dark-haired practicality, and the supporting cast is replete with juicy turns from many of France’s stable of able farceurs.  But among them Huppert and Luchini stand out.  She’s the very model of the prima donna trapped in the past, certain that her brilliance is due for rediscovery; her flamboyant delivery, reminiscent of the silent-movie style Chaumette would have mastered, is delicious.  Luchini, meanwhile, plays the bumbling civil servant with a obliviousness about his ineptitude that would do Inspector Clouseau justice; he has two great scenes, a hilarious bit of business when he interrogates Boon’s suave architect over an alibi that turns out to be himself, and a give-and-take with Huppert over an array of open cases she might lay claim to.

“The Crime Is Mine” is a very artificial confection, and there are moments when its archness becomes a bit much, but overall it’s a delectable divertissement.  Be sure to stay around for the start of the closing credits, where the futures of many of the characters are delightfully recorded in the style of the period scandal sheets represented by Gilbert Raton (Félix Lefebvre), the young reporter who’s happy to spread news about Madeleine’s case.  You’ll be glad you did; the bit provides a great close to an enjoyable Gallic romp.