Eleanor’s Secret 2009

Seven-year-old Nathaniel, [Arthur Dubois], and his older sister Angelica, [Stéphane Flamand], move into their eccentric Aunt Eleanor, [Jodi Forrest], whose will leaves them this peculiar house after she dies. Angelica often teases her little brother for traits she deems immature, from his reading struggles to his morning quirks, and the two squabble as they explore their new surroundings. Yet Nathaniel’s curiosity is sparked by a locked room Eleanor never allowed anyone to enter, a mystery that makes him yearn to understand what was kept behind its door.

In Eleanor’s will, Nathaniel is promised a key to the sealed room, while Angelica is given a porcelain doll that seems to whisper secrets of the house’s past. That very first night, a thunderstorm sears through the attic, tearing at the roof and leaving the family strained and worried about repairs they cannot afford. With their parents unable to fund the needed fixes, Nathaniel proposes selling the books that fill the attic shelves, hoping to raise enough money to stabilize their home.

Yet the attic holds a greater magic than money could ever measure. When Nathaniel returns to the room, the miniature figures from the tales Eleanor read aloud—[Alice] [Hester Wilcox], [Puss in Boots] [Paul Bandey], [Pinocchio] [Barbara Weber-Scaff], and [Little Red Riding Hood] [Aaricia Dubois] among them—step into the real world and declare him their guardian. They explain that he must read a spell aloud to keep them alive for the next five hours, otherwise they will vanish into dust and memory. Overwhelmed, Nathaniel discovers he cannot read the spell, and the fearsome Witch of the stories, the wicked Fairy known as Carabosse, confronts him with mockery and menace, shrinking him to the size of a toy so the danger can truly begin. Carabosse, [Christine Flowers], makes it clear that the fate of the living tales now rests in his ability to protect them all.

The situation grows even tighter when an unscrupulous antique seller arrives, delighted to discover that the books may be first editions worth a fortune. He schemes to pass them off as worthless so he can resell them for a much higher price, a plan that traps Nathaniel and his new companions in a perilous web of deception. To survive, the group—alongside the Ogre they meet on the road—must find a way back to Eleanor’s house before the spell expires and before the seller can pull the living stories apart.

On their journey, the troupe faces a string of challenges that test courage and loyalty. They travel with the help of several of the living tales, including the agile [White Rabbit] [Lorànt Deutsch], who darts ahead through strange landscapes, and the brave [Alice] [Hester Wilcox], who pursues clues with a calm, hopeful energy. They also cross paths with the nimble [Puss in Boots] [Paul Bandey], the resourceful [Pinocchio] [Barbara Weber-Scaff], and the steadfast [Sleeping Beauty] [Sharon Mann], each character adding a different skill to their fragile coalition. The road is not easy: there are moments of danger and doubt, a beach encounter with a cautious crab, and the ever-present risk that the spell could fail and send them all back before Nathaniel proves himself capable of reading it.

As the clock ticks, the group presses on, determined to return to Aunt Eleanor’s house so that the spell can be spoken aloud and the enchantment broken. When Nathaniel finally musters the courage to recite the incantation, he begins to grow back to his real size, and the magical crisis reaches its turning point. He returns to the antique seller’s shop, confronts the witch, and compels her to restore him to full size. With the danger behind them, the family returns to their home and the needed funds appear not from a sale of books but from the hidden value within a porcelain doll that Angelica had received, revealing jewelry that provides the money to repair the battered house.

Back in the safety of Eleanor’s attic, the siblings discover a renewed appreciation for one another and for the power of stories. They realize that the books and the characters they’ve met are not mere fantasy but a reminder of the importance of imagination, memory, and the shared joy of reading. In the end, Nathaniel and Angelica choose to embrace reading together, turning the attic into a place of wonder rather than a locked secret, and they settle into a new routine where the tales live on not as possessions to be sold, but as stories to be cherished and passed down.