Felicie and Victor run away from an orphanage and go to Paris to fulfill their dreams of being a dancer and being an inventor. Felicie finds herself in a Paris Opera where she meets Odette, a former ballerina now caretaker of the place. Odette teaches Felicie everything she knows of what it takes to be a ballerina.
Blaine: “Leap!” is a foreign film because it was released in Paris first and there it was called “Ballerina”. Elle Fanning, Maddie Ziegler and Carly Rae Jepsen were already apart of the cast. When “Ballerina” was brought to the United States it not only got a new title, but three more actors were added to the ensemble. “Ballerina” was presented by Eric Summer and Eric Warin in 2010 to a French company called L’Atelier Animation and they immediately fell in love with the idea and wanted to show what passion is for a child.
All the dancing in “Leap!” was choreographed by two professional dancers, Aurelie Dupont and Jeremie Belingard. The two were very happy to take part in “Leap!” All of their dance moves were filmed, then the animators would draw their moves on paper and then storyboard the dance elements. Felicie has passion for dancing, is energetic and she also brings out the good in people like Odette, Louis Merante, Camille and Luteau and shows them they are not all that bad thanks to her kindness and showing them that dreams can be possible sometimes. Victor’s a goofball and that’s what makes him so funny. He wants to be an inventor, but I think the thing he wants to do the most is fly and that’s why he invents wings that you can strap on to yourself.
Elle Fanning was apart of “Leap!” from the beginning before her character, Felicie, was designed. They would record Elle’s face while they were recording her voice to add her facial expressions to the character. Singer Carly Rae Jepsen was in the middle of a tour in Montreal, Canada when they recorded her voice for the character Odette, Felicie’s dance instructor. To Carly doing the voice of an animated character was like playing a video game because the character’s lips were already moving and she had to get that right tone for her voice. It took an hour for Carly to get it right.
Mel Brooks was one of the actors who was later added into the film when it arrived in the Uniter States. Kate McKinnon was added as well and she felt very happy to play three different characters. The nun at the beginning who feels that what Felicie does is foolishness. She also did the voice of Regine, the evil character of “Leap!” Sheri thought that Regine’s looks were similar to the evil stepmother from “Cinderella”. I knew she would be evil enough to sabotage Felicie from getting the part in the Nutcracker like cheating or trying to kill her. Her daughter, Camille, did the cheating part by pushing down Felicie a lot during their dance battle and Regine was the one trying to kill her after she got the part. The third character Kate voiced was Felicie’s late mother who she dreams about a lot and inspired her to dance. Kate has a lot of experience in playing different characters because she plays tons of different characters on “Saturday Night Live” and she’s that good.
Felicie’s friend, Victor, was originally voiced by Dane DeHaan in the Paris version. For the American version they replaced Dane’s voice with Nat Wolff’s. Nat Wolff would try to make the tone of his voice match the way the animated character’s lips were moving as he was looking at the screen right in front of him. Nat had never done an animated film before and he wanted to prepare himself for this role and bring a lot of character into his voice performance. He watched his favorite animated features like “Toy Story”, “Finding Nemo” and “Cars” in order to understand what it takes to put a lot into your voice. Victor's voice has a lot of expression in it and that’s what Nat had to do.
Elle Fanning didn’t have to do what Nat Wolff and Carly Rae Jepsen did because when she went into the recording studio they would record her voice first and work on the animation later. It was nice for Elle to have the freedom to say her lines without having to match them with the lip movements of the animated character. Everyone who worked on “Leap!” was moved by the inspiring message that it sends to kids and that is “never give up on your dreams”.
My rating on “Leap!” is five out of five stars.
Songs
“Be Somebody” by Chantal Kreviazuk
“Unstoppable” by Camila Mora
“Blood Sweat and Tears” by Magical Thinker & Dezi Paige
