Adam Elliott’s stop-motion animation about a snail-collecting outsider is an offbeat and bittersweet saga, shifting between tragedy and comedy in a story about the shells we place on ourselves.
I was a fan of Mary and Max, Elliott’s 2009 claymation feature, and his new movie shares the same instinct and affinity for the misfits, underdogs and lonely souls. Though I should have been prepared for this, I was still shocked at times by its adult themes, reminding you that you’re not watching something aimed at children. You just don’t normally expect to see nudity, swinging parties and various sexual kinks in an animated movie with cute-looking characters.
Sarah Snook (of Succession fame) voices Grace Pudel, a woman who we know instantly is at the end of her tether. She tells her life story to Sylvia, her favorite pet snail, who is a loyal listener only because she can’t travel fast after being set free. Grace’s life is no picnic: born prematurely with a split lip, to a mother who didn’t survive childbirth and a paraplegic father who didn’t live long enough to see Grace and her twin brother Gilbert grow up. The siblings are callously split up and sent to live with two foster families. Grace ends up in drab suburban Canberra, with a flaky couple addicted to key parties; Gilbert is placed with a family of ultra-religious nutcases who own an apple orchard outside Perth.
Grace is a lonely kid who grows up to be a lonely woman and a hoarder, with her childhood fascination with snails becoming an obsessive need for more and more snail memorabilia that crowds her house. She remains a sweet and kind soul, but she has retracted into herself very much like her beloved invertebrate. Other than letters from Gilbert, Grace’s life is brightened up by friendship with Pinky, an eccentric and irrepressible old woman who’s lived a full life and favours giant sunglasses, colourful clothes and hash-spiced gingerbread cookies. Though Pinky actually dies at the very beginning of the movie, you get a feeling that her character is going to be crucial in Grace’s journey towards freedom and confidence.
Much of Memoir of a Snail is desperately sad, with layer upon layer of tragedy, abuse and misfortune, but its melancholy is offset by the distinctly Australian humour and visual playfulness, with pot shots taken at religious fundamentalism, self-help books and safetyism. The bleakness might be too much for some, however it all builds up to a very moving and hopeful conclusion where life reveals some of its unexpected graces.
Elliott’s whimsical, sepia-toned world is lovingly detailed and gorgeous, both fantastical and gritty enough for the heavy emotions to register. As a Melburnian, I loved the quirky takes on the city’s well-known streets and landmarks like the Luna Park and Brunswick Street. I can’t imagine the amount of craft and patience that goes into producing a stop-motion film, and it was wonderful to see this uniquely tactile medium on a big screen. Even if it was a smallish big screen in a tiny cinema.
P.S. I never used to visit it much, but the Classic Cinemas in Elsternwick is becoming one of my favourite movie places. Every time I went there recently it had a lovely buzz that’s almost completely missing from the bigger cinema chains, unless some mega-popular blockbuster is showing.
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