April and the Extraordinary World

April and the Extraordinary World (originally titled *Avril et le Monde truqué*, meaning “April and the Rigged World”) is a 2015 animated alternate history film. It was co-directed by Christian Desmares and Franck Ekinci, who also co-wrote the script with Benjamin Legrand. Marion Cotillard voices the lead character. The story takes place in a dystopian steampunk setting inspired by the artwork and ideas of comic artist Jacques Tardi. It follows a young scientist as she carries on her great-grandfather’s research and searches for her missing family.

In this world, Napoleon III died in a building explosion, and his son’s clever diplomacy prevented the Franco-Prussian War. Over the next seventy years, scientists vanish one by one, halting technological progress and causing severe pollution. By 1941, April Franklin—great-granddaughter of scientist Gustave Franklin—is working on a serum for eternal life. The only success so far is her cat Darwin, who can now talk. Meanwhile, the bumbling Inspector Gaspar Pizoni chases her family, hoping to hand their research to the government for war use. April learns her parents perfected the serum years ago and hid the results inside her snowglobe. She finds a warning from her father and is pursued by a toxic black cloud. A petty criminal named Julius, hired by Pizoni to follow her, rescues April and Darwin.

Using the message, April reunites with her grandfather Prosper “Pops” Franklin, who has been hiding from Pizoni for ten years. Julius reluctantly hands Pops over to Pizoni. The authorities take Pops to a government weapons research center at Fort-la-Latte, where he finds other scientists studying a mysterious machine recovered from the sea—an electrically powered airplane. Julius returns to April just as cyborg soldiers attack Pops’ house. April discovers the house can transform into a mobile bunker, so she, Julius, and Darwin flee to Fort-la-Latte.

They escape on the repaired plane, with Pizoni stowed away. Onboard, they find a film revealing the truth: the scientists were kidnapped by two sentient komodo dragons bred by Gustave in 1870. The lizards, Rodrigue and Chimène, have used the scientists to build a jungle ecosystem beneath Paris, where the scientists work with the lizards’ offspring on a major project. The lizards remotely hijack the plane, but Pizoni crashes it into the jungle. There, April, Darwin, and Juliu