Leap
WHAT'S THE STORY?
Set in 1879 France, LEAP! follows best friends Felicie (voiced by Elle Fanning) and Victor (Nat Wolff), who escape their stifling orphanage in Brittany for Paris, where they hope to make their dreams a reality. For Felicie, that's becoming a dancer; for Victor, it's becoming an inventor. After finding her way to the Grand Opera House, Felicie ends up begging custodian Odette (Carly Rae Jepsen) for a job as a servant's assistant at the mansion of wealthy arts patron Regine (Kate McKinnon).
When Regine's mean-girl daughter Camille (Maddie Ziegler) is invited to join the Opera's prestigious Ballet School, Felicie decides to borrow Camille's identity and take the spot instead. Felicie eventually turns to Odette, who was once a brilliant ballerina before an injury cut her career short, for training in order to secure an audition for a starring role in The Nutcracker. Meanwhile, Victor snags an entry-level position in the workshop of Gustav Eiffel.
IS IT ANY GOOD?
This animated ballet story is partly inspiring and partly confounding, with missteps (like unnecessary romance) that could have been fixed had the tween protagonists been a couple of years older. Felicie isn't always particularly likable or laudable (she does steal someone's identity to fake her way into a prestigious ballet school, despite not having even basic dance training), but she is persistent and willing to do the work. While it's still utterly unbelievable that someone could learn enough classical ballet to defeat an entire class of 11-year-old girls who've been dancing for years, at least she ultimately has to face consequences for her actions and prove she's really got the goods.
Fanning is nicely enthusiastic as Felicie, and Wolff does a good job with Victor, the clever, eager-to-please/impress best friend. And Jepsen (whose speaking voice sounds a bit like Idina Menzel's) believably embodies the stern but encouraging Odette, Felicie's ballet mentor/instructor. With themes familiar from The Karate Kid(jump up and ring the bell) and even Titanic (especially an odd, slightly off-putting love triangle, a sequence in which Felicie dances Irish jig-style in a pub, and a moment when a cute boy declares they're "on top of the world"), the story feels a little "old" to revolve around an 11-year-old character.
