This Beautiful Tragedy — Memoir of a Snail
One of the hardest things to do when you’re feeling down is to get out of your own head. If you dwell too long in your pain, you risk being consumed by it. At the same time, if you try to qualify it by comparing it to others, you also risk minimizing your own lived experience. Someone, somewhere, is always going to have it worse than you, but that doesn’t negate what you’re going through in the moment. It’s a very delicate balance to maintain, and sometimes the best you can do is look for the small moments of joy and humor within life’s trials as a means to begin healing and moving forward.
Adam Elliot, the visionary stop-motion director behind the gorgeous Mary and Max and the Oscar-winning short Harvie Krumpet, gives us all a ruthless but extremely heartfelt exploration of that idea in his latest “Clayography,” (a portmanteau of another portmanteau, “claymation,” and “biography,” as each of his films is semi-autobiographical in nature) Memoir of a Snail, which won the Best Feature prize at this year’s Annecy Film Festival, and is a very strong candidate for next year’s Animated Feature Oscar. Combining the tribulations of a lifelong tragic personal odyssey with the need for the sheer rebellious act of hope, Elliot weaves a deeply sad tapestry that’s as depressing at points as it is hilarious and shockingly life-affirming, a bit of narrative acrobatics that few can pull off.
The film begins with Grace (voiced by Sarah Snook) sitting at the bedside of her elderly friend Pinky (Jacki Weaver) as she passes away after a bout with Alzheimer’s. Pinky’s final words, “THE POTATOES!” leave Grace confused and distraught, wondering what the demented missive could mean while also mourning the fact that she’s truly alone in the world. Sitting in Pinky’s garden, next to a potato patch, because that’s all she can think of for Pinky’s intent, Grace releases a jar full of snails, focusing on one she named Sylvia (even painting the name on the shell), and tells of her own sorrowful history, encouraging Sylvia to live a more fulfilling life once set free.
It’s not a pretty picture, I assure you, and not just because Elliot takes several visual cues from the likes of Tim Burton and Henry Selick, with gothic imagery, warped character models, and a washed-out color palette. Grace was born prematurely, along with her twin Gilbert (Kodi Smit-McPhee), and had to have postnatal surgery to repair a cleft lip. Her mother died in childbirth, and her father (Dominique Pinon) had little chance to be a proper parent, as injuries had cut short his career as a street performer and rendered him a paraplegic alcoholic. Once he passed, Grace and Gilbert were separated for adoption, with Grace landing with a well-adjusted couple (Paul Capsis voices both parts) who nonetheless abandoned her for large periods of the time to be swingers, and Gilbert being shipped off to the other end of the country (Grace moved from Melbourne, Australia to Canberra while Gilbert was sent to Perth) to be raised by an abusive and cultish fundamentalist family of Christian apple farmers.
Things are indeed very bleak, but through it all, Grace has been able to cope and carry on thanks to two constant sources of support. The first is Gilbert himself, who took his job as a protective brother to heart and always stood up for her against bullies and the various bad things in the world, while also training himself to be a magician so he could be the star his father couldn’t and just to see Grace smile and be happy. The second is the snail. Grace’s late mother had an affinity for the tiny gastropods, and so Grace took up a collection of various books, trinkets, and bits of artwork as a way to sort of still feel connected to her.
Little things like these are what keep Grace going in the face of hardship, and they’re also what give the film its next-level charm and humanity. It would be so easy to have Grace simply wallow in her misery, but like all of us, she finds those small victories that make life worth living. On the other side of the spectrum is Pinky, who has experienced her own fair share of misfortune and irony, but also can see the comedy in the randomness in life and proceed happily without deluding herself into a Pollyanna state of blissful ignorance. When Grace meets Pinky (a moment of pure endearing silliness where Grace, working at the local library, informs Pinky that what she thinks is a book return slot is actually a trash bin), the two complement each other perfectly, with Pinky getting a new friend in her late age and Grace receiving some much-needed neutral perspective on things.
We even get to see Grace’s life improve as time wears on. She meets and marries a charismatic man named Ken (Tony Armstrong). She learns the value of empathy by helping a homeless man (Eric Bana) as a child. She finds fulfillment in her work and her snails. And of course, she clings to the hope of reunion with Gilbert once he’s old enough to move back to the east coast. Despite everything she’s been through, she does ultimately lead a good life.
But of course, the universe has its way of fucking with you when everything seems to be going well, and in true Morton Salt fashion, when it rains it pours. Plans get cancelled. Harsh truths get revealed. Her collection slowly becomes a hoarding obsession. Death becomes a constant companion. We’ve all had times in our lives when it just feels like the entire world has singled us out to be shit on, and Elliot illustrates it flawlessly by showing the raw trauma of it all while also injecting a few well-timed dark gags.
It all works to excellent effect to get us to engage with Grace as a person rather than a stop-motion doll with a slug-eyed beanie on her head and a scar on her lip. We see her as the macrocosm of her mollusk pets, slowly slogging through each day while trying to find any type of protective casing to let her hide from the overly cruel realities she’s constantly faced with. Because of that careful touch, we’re not only able to sympathize and relate, but we also feel the weight lift when things do turn around, to the point that I was truly satisfied with what I thought was the film’s conclusion until one last emotional whammy caught me off guard and nearly reduced me to tears.
Because as we’re all too aware, not everyone gets a happy ending. Most of us just find strength in our own resolve and take the minor wins we get along the way, trying to find happiness by playing the hand we’re dealt as best we can. So if and when those moments do come, they are to be celebrated and shared, because in doing so, we’re also trying to pass that joy on to others. I’d wager that most who experience such troubles are conditioned to be selfless and try to lift others up as well as themselves, and that’s the true triumph of a film like Memoir of a Snail. Life, at times, can feel like an endless parade of disappointments and defeats, but it’s only in going through those darkest moments that we can see the beauty in it all, and appreciate just how far we’ve come. I get the feeling that such a message will resonate with a lot of people, and it’s crucial that we keep it in mind, not just when we’re at our lowest.
Grade: A
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Originally published at http://actuallypaid.com on November 21, 2024.
