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SYLVAIN Chomet  is the torch-bearer for contemporary animation. While we are bombarded with clever CGI movies that are great to look at, this French animator uses more traditional methods of painstaking artwork, and here he has created a film which is nothing short of a masterpiece.

But as well as making a wonderful piece of moving art, Chomet marries visual brilliance with a downplayed script and storyline that manage to speak successfully to his audience.

He can take a theme – here the troubles facing an ageing magician in a changing world – and use it as a metaphor for the problems in the lives of every bum on every seat in the cinema watching this. It shows an intrinsic understanding of the human condition, as if Chomet was the cinematic answer to Thomas Hardy.

His 2003 film Belleville Rendezvous was lovely to look at and had a cracking tale.

Chomet has pulled off the same trick here. This is masterful animation, each scene given a depth and richness that makes it lovely to gaze on.

We meet stage magician Monsieur Tatischeff as he confronts a career crisis. His old-school tricks are being increasingly ignored by a public who want rock ’n’ roll played by good looking teens with long hair.

Poor Tatischeff is washed up – his gigs are in draughty music halls to unresponsive audiences.

Facing a life in the Parisian gutter, Tatischeff travels to London, and then on to a gig in the Western Isles up north.

Here he befriends a young country girl, who takes him to Edinburgh, where the magic cranks up a notch as he sets to work.

Throw in a cast of bit players – such as the crotchety rabbit who hates going into the magician’s hat, the lizard-like lounge singers who perform on the same bill as him – and each scene exudes charm. Visual gags abound, too.

Every moment where there is a need for a jokey prod to lighten things up, as if by magic, hey presto, here it comes.

Based on a script by Jacques Tati (whose real name is Tatischeff) as well as the glorious backdrops, this film’s sparse dialogue gives the viewer plenty of time to simply soak up the pictures.

Gallic grunts and sighs are the order of the day for much of the time, and a wistful soundtrack carries you along dreamily.

It also plays out an interesting riff about the transient nature of popularity and fame, and gives the viewer enough food for thought about celebrity.

But above all this is a homage to Edinburgh. The city is splendidly recreated.

From the 1950s vehicles on the streets to the little alleys snaking round the castle, the gruff Scots faces of the inhabitants and the magnificent views across the Firth, Edinburgh has been done a great service by the makers of this film.