Arthur and the Invisibles

In 1960, protagonist 10-year-old Arthur lives with his grandmother Daisy in a quiet farm house on a dirt road, in a small rural community in Northeastern Connecticut (based on Sterling). His grandfather Archibald has recently gone missing and he sees little of his parents (who are away looking for work). Daisy entertains Arthur with stories of his grandfather's adventures in Africa, featuring the tall Bogo Matassalai and the minuscule Minimoys, of whom the latter now live in Archibald's garden, protecting a collection of rubies. Arthur becomes enamoured of a picture of Selenia, the princess of the Minimoys. When Daisy receives a two-day deadline to pay a large sum of money to a building developer named Ernest Davido, who plans to evict the two, Arthur looks for the rubies to pay off the debt and discovers various clues left by his grandfather. He is met in the garden by the Bogo Matassalai, who reduce Arthur to Minimoy size. From the Minimoys, Arthur learns that they are in danger from Maltazard, a Minimoy war hero who now rules the nearby 'Necropolis', after corruption by a weevil, by whom he has a son named Darkos.

Arthur, reflecting his legendary British namesake, draws a sacred sword from its recess and uses it to protect the Minimoys from Maltazard's soldiers; whereupon Sifrat, the ruler of the Minimoys, sends Arthur to Necropolis, with the princess Selenia and her brother Betameche. En route, they are attacked on two occasions by Maltazard's soldiers. In Necropolis, Selenia kisses Arthur, marking him as her husband and potential successor, and confronts Maltazard alone. When Maltazard learns that she has already kissed Arthur and thus can no longer give him her powers and cure his corruption, he imprisons all three, who discover a Minimoy form of Archibald. Thereafter Arthur and his grandfather escape and return to human form, with little time to spare before Maltazard's flood reaches the Minimoys. With the help of Mino, a royal advisor's long-lost son, Arthur redirects the flood to Necropolis; whereupon Maltazard abandons Necropolis and his son, and the water ejects the rubies above ground. Archibald pays Davido with one ruby; and when he tries to take them all, the Bogo Matassalai capture him and give him to the authorities (scene deleted in the U.S. edition). The film ends with Arthur asking Selenia to wait for his return, and her agreement to do so.

• Freddie Highmore as Arthur. The main protagonist. A ten-year-old boy who journeys through the invisible world of the minimoys to find the treasure his long-lost grandfather had hidden. Brave, idealistic and clever, Arthur craves for adventure and falls in love with Selenia.
• Madonna as Princess Selenia, the daughter of Emperor Sifrat. Rebellious, fiery and at first appearing as aloof and arrogant, Selenia is courageous and actually cares for her people’s safety. She first views Arthur as “ordinary”, but she grows to love because of his bravery and kindness. character was dubbed by French singer Mylène Farmer in the French version Arthur et les Minimoys, German singer Nena in the German version Arthur und die Minimoys, Finnish pop singer Paula Vesala from PMMP in the Finnish version and Greek Pop singer Tamta in the Greek version, Swedish pop singer Robyn in the Swedish version.
• Jimmy Fallon as Prince Simono Matradoy de Betameche, or simply Betameche, Selenia's younger brother. He is the first minimoy Arthur befriends and is the first of the Minimoy royal children to whole-heartedly accept Arthur. Humorous, yet good-hearted, he provides some of the films’ comic relief.
• Mia Farrow as Daisy, Arthur's long-suffering grandmother. She is overprotective of Arthur and is distraught when Arthur travels into the Minimoy world.
• Robert De Niro as Emperor Sifrat XVI, Betameche and Selenia's father
• Snoop Dogg as Max, the leader of the Koolamassai, a race of beings similar to the Minimoys, who supply Maltazard's people with a 'candy fruit' and are therefore left relatively free
• David Bowie as Emperor Maltazard (also known as the Evil M, Maltazard the Evil, or Malthazar the Cursed), antagonist. Although the film refers to him as Malthazar, his name in the book was "Malthazard" and some film versions refer to him as Maltazard. For the Japanese release, he is voiced by Gackt who is also a singer and actor.
• Harvey Keitel as Miro, the royal advisor.
• Jason Bateman as Prince Darkos, Maltazard's vicious but dim-witted son. He has cat-like eyes, a mouthful of fangs and speaks with a lisp.
• Anthony Anderson as Koolamassai
• Chazz Palminteri as Travel agent

The animation was done by the French company BUF Compagnie, which hired approximately 100 animators, most of them from French animation schools and without any previous experience. Besson wanted a photorealistic environment, and BUF initially used microlenses to film physical environments, but eventually instead used photogrammetry, where a digitized photograph of a real object is manipulated with a computer. Sets were built to 1:3 scale, which allowed the animators to use natural elements, such as plants and grass. While the film did not use motion capture, real actors were used as reference, and recorded with 13 to 14 video cameras, but without the markers used in motion capture. Besson directed their performances. In terms of lip sync with actors' dialog, the French animators could not cope with the English phonemes. For Madonna and David Bowie, a camera was used to record their lips to help the animators. The animation was done with proprietary software.[5]

After a screening test in the United States, the Weinstein company edited the film.[16] Approximately nine minutes were cut. Most of the edits pertained to the love story between Arthur and Selenia (due to age differences). The Scenes were:

• Arthur's arrival at the Minimoy world in the middle of a Ceremony centering on Selenia's coming of age;
• Arthur falling in love with Selenia at first sight;
• Arthur removing a string from Selenia's corset to use as a climbing-rope, and Selenia taking the string back;
• Max referring to their drinks as 'Jack Fire' instead of Genie Soda. Also, when Arthur escapes the bar during the blackout, Max smokes something that resembles a blunt.
• Selenia kissing Arthur before confronting Maltazard, and Betameche congratulating them;
• Selenia kissing Arthur before he returns to his own world;
• Arthur learning of the custom that a princess must wait ten lunar months before kissing her chosen husband for the second time;
• Davido attempting to steal the treasure from Archibald, before being captured by the Bogo Matassalai;
• Arthur's Grandmother in the antique dealership prior to them arriving at her home;
• Max telling Selenia about his 7 wives while they are dancing;
• Malthazar confronting Selenia about her engagement to Arthur.
• Selenia teasing Arthur while crawling into the toy car, causing Arthur to gasp at the distracting display.

The entire storyline involving the parents and their greed for money was also deleted, cut short by a small cutscene and a narrator explaining that worrying over their son was all they needed to reform completely.

The British version of the film, also distributed by the Weinstein Company, similarly lacked these scenes.

Arthur and the Invisibles was followed by a 2009 sequel, Arthur and the Revenge of Maltazard, based on a novel of the same name, and another sequel in 2010 titled Arthur and The War of the Two Worlds, based on the final book in the series. In the UK & Ireland, both sequels were combined and made into a single movie titled Arthur and the Great Adventure, released in December 2010.

An animated TV series, Arthur and the Minimoys, was produced by Studio 100, and debut in 17 July 2018. A 20-episode web series is also being planned.[18]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Arthur and the Invisibles.

• Arthur and the Invisibles at IMDb
• Arthur and the Invisibles at AllMovie
• Arthur and the Invisibles at Box Office Mojo
• Arthur and the Minimoys at Keyframe
• Arthur and the Minimoys at CanMag
• Mylène Farmer et son rôle pour les 3 films