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It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

It’s sentimental, ridiculously long and only occasionally funny

The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

I first heard of this short when I saw that it was on the same DVD collection of short films as Andrea Arnold's gritty yet thought-provoking 'Wasp' and for a start I didn't know it was animated until I stumbled upon its IMDb profile, which made me want to see it more because I love animation. Upon watching it on YouTube, I found it bizarre yet amusing in parts.The opening and closing scenes of some American tourists in Paris were colourful with accurately-drawn backgrounds but also one of the most unusual parts of the film because I was expecting French dialogue, which was present in 'Ernest and Celestine' but they were speaking English with French subtitles on the screen. The human characters are oddly designed as well but the animation is smooth for the most part. There is minimal dialogue outside the opening and closing scenes and the colours of the scenes of the old lady feeding the pigeons are not the brightest. Although she speaks gibberish, I found her a generous character. The principal male character is grumpy and greedy but I enjoyed watching his bizarre nightmare where some human/pigeon hybrids eat a pig the old lady leaves for them as well as his insides. Another odd part was the repetitive sequence of the man coming to the old lady's flat wearing a papier-mâché pigeon mask to be fed from mid- September until Christmas Eve and progressively becoming fatter. The incidental music is nearly as sparse as the dialogue but I like its authenticity.Out of all four French animated independent films I've seen so far this year ('The Illusionist,' 'The Monk and the Fish,' 'Ernest and Celestine' and this one), this is the strangest one but all in all a pleasant surprise with its funny moments. 8/10.

THE OLD LADY AND THE PIGEONS was nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film in 1998 and wow was that a tough year to choose! In one of the best lineup of films I can remember, the Pixar short GERI'S GAME beat out such terrific films as Petrov's MERMAID and this film. As for the other two films, FAMOUS FRED and REDUX RIDING HOOD, I saw FRED and wasn't very impressed and I can't find a copy of REDUX. However, as a "three horse race", it was very, very tight because all three were terrific films.Oddly, the winner of the award was my least favorite of the three--as I think there are quite a few better Pixar shorts. MERMAID was by far the most beautiful and artistic and PIGEONS was by far the funniest and strangest of the films. As to whether I prefer the Russian or French film, I am not sure--I loved them both.The film begins and ends with some very stereotypical American tourists. This was a two-edged sword. While they were very funny (especially in the final sequence), I also worry that this is just encouraging French hatred of Americans. Both countries need to relax a bit in the stereotypes and this film is like gasoline in the fire--albeit, very, very funny "gasoline".Then, after this odd introduction, the film begins in earnest. There is a policeman who is very, very hungry and doesn't seem to have any money for food. And while walking his beat, he notices that an old lady is feeding the pigeons like they are kings and he's jealous. So in a very weird twist, he starts grabbing pigeons off the sidewalks, stripping them of their feathers and making himself a false pigeon head from them!! He looks ridiculous but the old lady is apparently either blind or senile or both because she invites him into her home and feeds him as well. You'd think she would give him and the real pigeons bread or seeds, but feeds them wine, pastry and meat!! Where it all goes from here, you'll have to see for yourself. The film is very funny, twisted and occasionally dark. But because it is so unique and so wonderful, I really wish this and MERMAIDS could have shared the Oscar--they were both that good.

If you have ever wondered what Sylvain Chomet, the creator of Les Triplettes de Belleville did before that, then I can tell you: it's this, an entirely characteristic, shorter and considerably darker tale of pigeons and policemen, allied to a cruel dig at American tourists in Paris. The animator's Searle-like style is already fully formed and one or two of the beloved character types from Belleville (the dog, the diminutive mother) appear here too. Vieille Dame is not however merely a dry run for the fully fledged feature, more an extended taster of a unique talent. At only 20 mins it is still worth seeking out and is coupled on disc with three other animations laced with dark humour, although sadly not by Chomet. Only available from Amazon.fr apparently as part of a 50 minute DVD, and without English subtitles - although as only one of the four animation uses language to any extent, and the lesser of these too, this is not a real problem. Recommended.

This wonderfully dotty short film from the creator of Belleville Rendez-vous, Sylvain Chomet, really is fantastic. It has an original storyline - a starving gendarme, some greedy fat pigeons, a pigeon-obsessed lady, and some wild dancing.The animation puts its grotesque characters (which put me in mind of the drawings of Gerald Scarfe) into a world all of their own, where the gendarme fantasises about food, is irritated by pigeons, and eventually dresses up as one of the birds himself to continually visit the old lady for slap-up meals.'The Old Lady and the Pigeons' is the epitome of bad taste cartoons, a darkly fun half-hour in the company of skewed figures and warped minds.