Michel Ocelot

Six exotic fables, each unfold in a unique locale, from Tibet, to medieval Europe, an Aztec kingdom, the African plains, and even the Land of the Dead.

Studio Ghibli is Japan's most successful animation studio, with helmers Hayao Miyazaki ("Spirited Away," "My Neighbor Totoro") and Isao Takahata ("Grave of The Fireflies," "The Tale of Princess Kaguya") creating a bonanza for producer/prexy Toshio Suzuki. Generously adorned with clips from their films and their influences, the docu follows Ghibli's arc from a mid-'60s rebellion against working conditions at Toei Co. to its present powerhouse position, complete with public fun park. All interviews are illuminating, but Miyazaki is teasingly confined to pic's tete-a-tete finale with esteemed French comic artist Jean "Moebius" Giraud. Meeting of the wizened European, whose imprint is on films from "Blade Runner" to "The Fifth Element," and the apparently relaxed Nipponese helmer makes an interesting contrast, and will be of special interest to Francophiles. All credits are impeccable

In a white lace universe, three inventors create machines which are both pretty and useful. Unfortunately people do not understand them...

Four tales about princesses and adventurers around the world: The Mistress of Monsters, The Wizard Student, The Ship's Boy and His Cat, and Ivan Tsarevitch and his changeable princess.

A hard-working peasant begins his day by praising Saint Martin, who descends from the heavens and rewards him by granting him and his cruel, browbeating wife four wishes.

On her throne, a princess welcomes her suitors under the watchful eye of her family and the kingdom. Down below, amongst the crowd, struggles a poor hunchback.

A fancy dress ball takes place in a strange palace. The host is unknown. The theme: "your idea of human representation”. During the course of this mysterious and rather frightening evening, each guest is transformed into his own character and the intrigue thickens.

The Insensitive Princess is a 1983 French animated television series written and directed by Michel Ocelot. The animation is a combination of cel and cutout animation while the elaborate architectural style of the production design has been said to be reminiscent, though visual association, of Charles Perrault and Jean de La Fontaine's fairy tales; like Ocelot's Les Trois Inventeurs before it and several episodes of the later Ciné si it takes place in a literary fairy tale-like fantasy setting, specifically a palatial theater, which mixes the ornate styles of decoration and dress of the upper-classes of both the time of the Ancien Régime and the belle époque and includes such fanciful technology as a baroque-styled submarine, elements of outright fantasy such as dragons and such anachronisms as a reference to motorcycles. It won first prize in its category at the 3rd Bourg-en-Bresse Animation Festival for Youth and the audience prize at the 6th Odense Film Festival.