Every once in a while I like to throw a cartoon into our mix just to please my wife. Ernest et Celestine even gets bonus points for being a French-Belgian production based on a series of Belgian children’s books. I get to fill both my quota of cartoons and my quota of non-English foreign films at the same time!

There are all sorts of ways a simple story about a friendship between a bear and a mouse could go wrong. It could be too childish, it could be schmaltzy, it could try too hard to be clever. So it’s a minor miracle that Ernest & Celestine, despite being very unashamedly a cartoon aimed primarily at children, falls into none of these traps.

I was surprised to note that other than the two very sympathetic and likable friends, the story also involves a decent bit of worldbuilding. Seeing the underground civilization of the mice, built upon the versatility of their incisors, was great fun to me. Stuff like Ernest’s begging for food song could have been silly in lesser hands. But the lyrics, animation and Ernest’s personality made the whole thing incredibly funny for me. Similarly, the little mice being scared of the big, evil bear looked and sounded just right.

In an age in which animated features mean computer generated graphics, this film’s throwback to traditional hand-drawn animation feels refreshingly different. Moreover, the watercolor-based art style feels very European and distinct from Japanese anime. For someone like me who grew up with English-language children’s books in just this style in the house, it instantly evokes feelings of familiarity, coziness and nostalgia.

But perhaps the main reason why this worked so well is that it is completely upfront and plays everything straight. It eschews snark, sarcasm and references to popular culture. This gives Ernest et Celestine the timeless feeling of a classic. The whole film is written for children with no attempt to focus group in specific elements to appeal to other age groups. Yet it also demonstrates that a good, solid children’s story, written honestly and with heart, can appeal to everyone. I’d recommend it highly.