The film veers from quasi-real to cartoonily silly and scenes either drag or whirl by too fast.
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What are critics saying?
New York Magazine (Vulture) by Bilge Ebiri
The patient storytelling and the elegant and colorful hand-drawn animation combine to give the film a pleasing, picture-book-like quality that should appeal to kids; there’s something very old-school about the film’s aesthetic. But in some senses, it also feels like a blast of fresh air, not the least because of where, and on whom, it chooses to place its focus.
While the gorgeous widescreen landscapes have a pencil-and-aquarelle quality, the characters themselves are literally rougher-edged, a clever reminder of the hand-drawn, sketchlike quality of traditional animation.
The Hollywood Reporter by Jordan Mintzer
Using a wide-ranging color palette that shifts from the warmer hues of the Sahara desert to the colder, sadder blues and grays of old-time Paris, Lie and his team provide a pared-down animation technique that recalls classic Disney, albeit with a rougher, at times abstract touch.
The New York Times by Nicolas Rapold
Zarafa may not be the most groundbreaking feat of storytelling, but it does have a giraffe in a balloon.
Village Voice by Sherilyn Connelly
Beautifully animated and often moving.
The Dissolve by Tasha Robinson
Everything about the way this story is rendered makes it feel much bigger than the characters and their limited travails can make it.
Time Out London by Tom Huddleston
Zarafa never pauses for breath, rattling from one hasty, perfunctory sequence to another.