The Prince of Jewels

Two Dutch children stumble on a clearing in the woods where gnomes are going about their business. The gnomes are friendly to the children. A witch comes and takes them away on her broom to her gingerbread house, where she turns nasty on them, turning the boy into a spider, her yowling cat to stone, and tries to turn the girl into a rat when a gnome's arrow stops her. While the gnomes are fighting the witch, Hansel and Gretl free the other children who have been imprisoned and transformed by the witch.

Raised on tales of a Djinn fairy princess, Azur, a young Frenchman goes to North Africa in search of the sprite, only to discover that his close childhood friend, Asmar, an Arab youth whose mother raised both boys also seeks the genie.

The people of Hamelin, overrun with rats, offer a bag of gold to anyone who can get rid of the rats. A piper offers to do the job, and successfully lures the rats into a mirage of cheese, which disappears. The citizens, disappointed that all he did was play a tune, offer only pocket change. The piper, angered, plays a new tune that has all the children of the city follow him, even the new twins the stork is preparing to deliver.

Pil, a little vagabond girl, lives on the streets of the medieval city of Roc-en-Brume, along with her three tame weasels. She survives of food stolen from the castle of the sinister Regent Tristain. One day, to escape his guards, Pil disguises herself as a princess. Thus she embarks upon a mad, delirious adventure, together with Crobar, a big clumsy guard who thinks she's a noble, and Rigolin, a young crackpot jester. Pil is going to have to save Roland, rightful heir to the throne under the curse of a spell. This adventure will turn the entire kingdom upside down, and teach Pil that nobility can be found in all of us.

In this episodic animated fantasy from France, an art teacher interprets a series of six fairy tales (each involving a prince or princess) with the help of two precocious students. Princes and Princesses was created using a special style of cutout animation, with black silhouetted characters performing the action against backlit backdrops in striking colors.