When it comes to animation, it is hard to deny that it is predominantly a medium that is played safe. South Park is popular so let's make cartoons along those same lines, SpongeBob is popular so let's make cartoons along those same lines, Disney's having a surge in popularity, let's make The Swan Princess, Anastasia, Quest for Camelot, hey that movie that dude has been working on since the sixties? Let's rewrite and re-edit it so it fits better as a Disney-like movie. Every era of animation has their safe trends, the eighties had toy based cartoons, the nineties had gross-out cartoons, the 2000s had anime inspired cartoons and cartoons with a hyperactive and/or naïve lead in a more serious world, and the 2010s have cartoons that start cute and light-hearted before becoming much darker and more serious. Even in animated movies, I've talked about this before how most animated kids movies feel very formulaic and don't really offer anything too much outside of the box. So when a movie comes around that is a much bigger risk than something like Minions 2 or Paws of Fury, what can I do other than talk about it?
Marcel The Sell With Shoes On is a very risky movie, it is a mockumentary where the lead characters are stop motion animated characters interacting with a real live cast. Essentially it's another Special Effects Movie, and it's a riskier kind of movie because this is not the kind of movie you see in theatres anymore. Mockumentaries are not very common, you can name This Is Spinal Tap, but what other popular mockumentaries are there? On top of that, they are usually never animated, the only one I can think of that was is Surf's Up, and that one was Computer Generated. This movie is a risk, and that is what I love about animation, sometimes it is still able to take risks. Steven Universe was a risk, BoJack Horseman was a risk, Toy Story was a risk, and Marcel The Shell With Shoes On is a risk.
Of course, not all risks pay off, movies are called "Risks" for a reason, so there needs to be more than the risk factor. Thankfully, Marcel The Shell With Shoes On has fun moments of humour, some really great emotional moments, and it's all tied together with one of the best and most adorable leads I've seen in an recent animated movie. Marcel is a fantastic character, seeing how he solves problems, how he deals with all the things that go on around him, his hope and optimism become worry and fear, and his little quips and interactions with Dean, the secondary lead, all make him so believable, that sometimes I just forgot that Marcel was an animated character, I genuinely believed that this was a real documentary about a real character at some points. It is kind of like those old Canadian P.S.A.s about the House Hippo, you know it isn't true, but there is still that part of you that likes to believe that there are House Hippos in a nest of discarded mittens and old lint scraps in your closet feasting on chips, raisins and the crumbs from peanut butter on toast.
It feels like a real documentary, and I think that is the biggest strength to the movie. Being a movie trying to emulate the feel of a documentary, it allows for more kind of interactions and movements that wouldn't be in a traditional movie. Movies try to show an idealized archetype, to either a positive or negative end, but since the crew was trying to emulate a documentary, it allows for Marcel to feel like a real, living character with his own personality and character, unlike someone like Zak from FernGully who feels like a stereotype who only exists within the confines of the movie, or the characters of Arctic Dogs who are just one dimensional tropes who go through the motions that are expected of said tropes. Marcel feels real.
Do I think this movie is going to be big? Well, I don't want to create false hope, but since the director of this movie, Dean Fleischer Camp, has been announced as the director of the live action Lilo & Stitch, if that turns out well, I do feel like this movie could become a very popular cult film, maybe not to the same level of The Nightmare Before Christmas, but at least more popular than something like The Thief and the Cobbler. I would love to see what Dean Fleischer Camp does in the future, and honestly I'd love to see what he could do at a studio like Laika, wouldn't that be something? As for Marcel, I went in expecting a cute movie, and I got a cute movie that offered quite a bit more. I would very much love to see more risky animated movies get released, because stagnation is the enemy of progress, so if you are able to watch Marcel The Shell With Shoes On, I do highly recommend you check it out.
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