Tim Burton’s long game is complete. Having been a champion of the stop motion animated genre, he’s passed on his love to Disney and Laika Studios, who’s been keeping the style alive for the past 20 years or so, making a movie every 2 to 3. Turns out that style worked its way to Australia, and found a kindred spirit in Adam Elliot. Memoir of a Snail is a culmination of everything he’s been doing as a filmmaker for 20 years, finding a perfect story that stands alongside the best the stop motion animation has ever produced. Even though it’s not really for kids, but let your freak flag fly and give this one a shot on date night. And bring tissues.
After an incredible opening sequence through a garbage dump worth of what looks like junk, we meet Grace Prudel (Sarah Snook) of Melbourne Australia. She is just releasing the last of the snails, Sylvia, she has been raising as her own children. As they slowly slug away, Grace starts talking about her life to Sylvia: growing up in the 1970s loving her protective brother Gilbert (Kodi Smit-McPhee) and her paraplegic father Percy (Dominique Pinon), being lonely and reading books, making a friend in the elder Pinky (Jackie Weaver), and what has happened to everyone as they’ve gotten older.
The joy of great stop motion animation is it bridges the gap between the strange and mainstream audiences. Memoir of a Snail is one of the best examples of this; a live action version of this movie would be horribly distracting because of Grace’s hobbies and choices. However, the animation allows Elliot to examine those behaviors, and dig deep into how they affect her choices, and vice versa. Instead of being creeped out, the audience instead feels this beautiful melancholy, as we learn about the tough upbringing Grace and Gilbert were forged under with this charming stop motion tapestry. It’s an incredible tale, that walks this miracle of a line between hope and positivity then being hit with unspeakable sadness without making us feel manipulated. By the end, we feel like we’ve lived life alongside grace as her imaginary friend, unfair that we can’t show up in her world and give her the hug she desperately needs many times throughout her life, and applauding at any progress she makes to try to overcome the garbage hand life dealt her and Gilbert. And it’s a doozy, worthy of may happy or sad tears and choke ups that happened to me with each new obstacle or victory.
The other part of the success of Memoir of a Snail is the voice cast, ready and willing to give their all to this movie. Sarah Snook leaves the opulence of Succession for the impoverished life of Grace with ease. She’s incredible here, finding the perfect tone of “hopeful longing” necessary to make the audience connect with this poor woman who can’t connect with most people in her life. Kodi Smit-McPhee is also good as brother Gilbert, taking on a quiet fierceness with Grace’s emotional open wound of a heart. As the siblings grow into their separate lives, 2 other voice actors wonderfully fill out the rest of the story, the secret weapons to Memoir of a Snails success. On the darker side is Magda Szubanski, playing as chilling of an animated character I have seen in some time. She’s equally strong willed but quite the opposite type of soul as Gilbert as they butt heads with one another. And on the brighter side is my MVP, Jackie Weaver. Her Pinky (the best designed character) is the shining star of this movie. It’s easy to see why Grace looks up to her: Pinky’s every bit as weird as Grace is, but it’s on her own terms, and she never suffers fools to mock her, simply moving on to another adventure. Weaver outwardly crafts an aging manic pixie dream girl and underneath it all layers in a nurturing love giving Grace the mother she never had.
I’m hoping Memoir of a Snail moves you as much as it moved me. I hope it movies you so much that you build your kids up to this film. Start them off with the Rankin & Bass Christmas specials to get them into the stop motion worlds. Then drop in a Frankenweenie here, a Nightmare Before Christmas there. Lead that up to Kubo & the Two Strings and more heavy handed storytelling. If they can handle that, then it’s probably snail time, somewhere in the 13-17 range. You might have a weirdo kid on your hands, but Memoir of a Snail should teach you that even weirdo kids can overcome anything and be anything. I’m gonna go cry again….