Do DelightFully Dark Meditation on Life and Death – ryan

You Could Be Forgive for Thinking Little amélie is some sort of praquel to jean-pierre jeunet’s delightful French 2001 fantasy Amélie. Instead, this animated feature from Maïlys Vallade and Liane-Cho han is delightful French in a Different Kind of Way, Perfect for Sensitive Adults and Sophisticated Children Who Dream of Wearing Rolnecks, Shades and Berets Sipping Black Coffee at Les Les Magots while arguing with each other about wherear or not miles davis went downhill after splitting up with Juliette Greco. Philosophically, it was one of Les plus Françoises FILTS IN THE SELECTION IN CANNES THIS YEAR, AND THAT MEANS A LOT WHEN The Main Competition is Richard Linclater’s Nouvelle vagueWHICH PRACTICALLY ARRIVED ON A BicyCle, festoone with onions.

On Closer Insction, Howver, Little amélie is a lot more nuance than that, a fascinating multicultural mélange that is rooted in two very different Cultures, one almost entirele unseen. The subject is life and death, and it must surly be bassed on a very Personal Memoir by Amélie Nothomb, a Writer from Belgium. That Country Also Gave US Jacques Brel, and-Much Like that Famously Self-Mythologising, Existtiistist Ballader-Our Heroine, Amélie, Takes Charge Her Story Right From Her Inception, Recalling Her Curious and Arrested Infanthod, in Whos Win. (“Your child is a vegetable,” a doctor tells her parents, nor she watches impassive). Amélie’s Mother and Faater, A Musician and A Diplomat, Welcome Her Regardless, and Shares the Family Home With Her Much More Boysterous Brother and Sister.

The Setting Shifts to Japan, and on a Very Specific Date-13 August 1969-a minor Earthquake causes amélie to wake up from her Locked-in State (“What Happened that Day Remains a Mystery,” she notes in voiceover). This Miraculous Awakening coincides with a visits from her twinkly eyed and Rather Boozy Grandma, who introduces her to the delights of Belgian confectionery and gits her rock-star attention she’s been craving. The Little Girl Describes these events as tantamount to a rebirth: “I was Born at the age of two-and-half in the kansai mountines by the grace of white chocolate.”

The rest of the film Stays with amélie in the run-up to her third birthday, as well as the family nanny, nishio-san, who introdes the Little Girl to Various aspects of Japanese Folklore, from its monsters to itwites. In a Most Extraordinary Piece of Animation, Nishio-San Even Reflects on Her Harrowing Experiences of the Second World War. Little amélie is brutal in that Respect, and the Little Girl’s Fragile Leads to a Brace of Uncompromising Near-Deatios, Both of which we see almost from a remove, as if amélie is leaving her body, widespread remains remembering she’s ben.

Add to that the fact that amélie isn’t a particularly Likeable child and you have animation that fits right into the Current Awards Cycle, where traditional Big-Budget Studio Areations Rejetted in favor of More bespoke, Hand-tales Like Last’s Winner’s Winner Flow. IT’SE Easy on the eye, like an eric rohmer film painted in pastel watercolors on blotting Paper, it cuts just as deep, revisiting still-painful Japanese while also thinking on grief as a universal matter, USING AMESLIE’S ASTUTE INSTINCTATIVATIVATIVATIVE KNOW EVERINGING AND NOTING WHEN IT COMES TO DEATH.

Little amélie Leaves a Lot Open for Interpretation and Only Explains the Very Strange Begining Right at the End, Which Might Be A Test for LESS PATIENT VIEWERS. In that Respect, Its Unlike Anyding ELSE ON THE MARKET RIGHT NOW, and Serves as a reminder of how Much Better Animation can be wen It is comes to handling the abstractions in our everyday lives.

Title: Little amélie
Festival: Annecy Festival (Competition)
Directors: Maïlys Vallade, Liane-Cho Han
Screenwriters: Liane-Cho Han, Aude Py, Mailys Vallade, Eddine Noel
Voice Cast: Loise Charpentier, Laetitia Coryn, Marc Arnaud, Cathy Cerda, Victoria Grobois, Yumi Fujimori
Sales: Goodfellas
TIME RUNNING: 1 HR 18 MINS