Marcel The Shell with Shoes On (2022)
dir. Dean Fleischer-Camp
Rated: PG
image: ©2022 A24
It’s often said that the best entertainment for children is the stuff that deals with the harsh realities of life, but on a level that kids can handle. Bambi’s mother getting killed by a hunter; Artax succumbing to the Swamp of Sadness in The Neverending Story; The loss and change that comes with getting older as explored in the Toy Story saga.
You can add a tiny, one-eyed talking seashell to the list. Based on three popular short films – the first won Best Animated Short at the 2010 AFI Fest, was an official selection of the 2011 Sundance Film Festival, and won the Grand Jury and Audience Awards at the New York International Children's Film Festival – Marcel is the brain child of filmmaker Dean Fleischer-Camp and actor Jenny Slate.
I was completely in the dark about little Marcel until I saw the trailer for his feature length debut earlier this year. All three of the short films were released to enthusiastic reception on YouTube between 2010 and 2014, and the two sequels were accompanied by illustrated storybooks.
Somehow, I completely missed the sensation of Marcel a decade ago. Better late than never. Fleischer-Camp and Slate’s adorable creation was a salve to my soul. Marcel reminds us all to appreciate the wonder in the everyday and to cherish those closest to us, because there’s no guarantee that they’ll be here tomorrow.
Marcel lives with his grandmother, Nanna Connie, in a house that has recently become an Airbnb. The house was formerly occupied by a couple named Mark and Larissa, but the couple fought often and eventually split up. (It’s worth noting that Fleischer-Camp and Slate were together romantically when they created Marcel. The two married in 2012; in 2016 they separated, but for the good of humanity, they decided to team up once again for the Marcel feature film.)
In a mad dash to get out of the house, Mark unwittingly packed up Marcel’s entire community and support system – the seashell collective hid in Mark’s sock drawer for cover when the couple would invariably begin knocking things over during their fights – leaving only Marcel and Nanna Connie behind.
Documentary filmmaker Dean has rented the Airbnb in the wake of his own marriage breaking up, and he is inspired by and fascinated with Marcel’s story. He begins to make a documentary about his plucky little roommate in the hopes that someone on the internet can help Marcel find his family.
It’s the eye that got me. That tiny googly eye that sits in the hole on his right side – our left – is impossibly expressive. It telegraphs an enormous amount of emotional information despite its size. Marcel speaks volumes with a hint of side-eye. Any time a (relatively) big, penny-sized tear welled up in that eye, I was a goner. Then again, maybe it was that eyelash-sized mouth, or those tiny shoes. It’s impossible to see this little guy and not want the absolute best for him.
I don’t know how much the process for animating Marcel in this new movie differs from what Fleischer-Camp and Slate did to bring their creation to life in the short films. For this feature-length picture, animation masters Chiodo Bros. Productions spearheaded the stop-motion wizardry. The Chiodo brothers have been working in clay modeling, stop-motion animation, and animatronics for four decades, but you most likely recognize the name from their 1988 cult-classic nightmare-fuel horror movie Killer Klowns from Outer Space.
The skills they use to make your flesh crawl in Killer Klowns is put to the opposite effect in Marcel. Something as simple as a tennis ball rolling around a house – Marcel’s inventive solution to traveling long distances now that he and Connie have only each other to rely on – becomes indescribably cute.
There’s also much more going on below the surface of Marcel than merely its cuteness. In the most delightfully throwaway manor, Marcel, and his movie, challenge notions about our modern world which are starting to feel like conventional wisdom. In our going-viral obsessed culture, Marcel states – so plainly that it instantly seems obvious – that the online frenzy of fans who appear in the wake of the little shell making a plea to find his family aren’t really what he needs.
“This is an audience, not a community,” Marcel says matter-of-factly. That fact is coldly underscored when the biggest development from Dean’s viral documentary clips turns out to be social media influencers using Marcel’s now-famous Airbnb house as the hip new background for their Instagram posts.
They aren’t interested in helping Marcel find his family, they’re only interested in using the ephemeral fame and popularity of Marcel to amplify their own brand. Community is about more than that. A community of people who know you and care about your wellbeing are crucial to us as social animals.
Jenny Slate’s voice is unrecognizable as Marcel. It’s soft and halting and Slate imbues the character with a too-inside-his-own-head quality that made me identify with the adorable little guy instantly. His admonishment of Dean’s dog, Arthur, when the dog gets too close to the ailing Nanna Connie is priceless.
The incomparable Isabella Rossellini is pitch perfect as Nanna Connie. Her light-as-a-feather voice and sweet Italian accent – in one of the funniest, sneeze-and-you’ll-miss-it jokes of the movie, Marcel tells us that Nanna Connie immigrated from the garage, hence the accent – bring a real warmth to the movie. Connie is also the most melancholic thing about Marcel the Shell with Shoes On.
The matriarch of this clan that has now been scattered to the four winds, Connie’s declining mental state and failing body are causes of deep concern for Marcel. He doesn’t have the resources of a robust community to help with Connie’s care, and as a result, the shell is in a constant state of worry. He can’t even fully enjoy the biggest moment of his life, meeting his idol, 60 Minutes reporter Lesley Stahl. (Marcel loves her, he tells us, because she is fearless.)
Producers for the TV news magazine get in touch with Dean when his viral clips showing Marcel searching for his family pique their interest. At first, Marcel turns them down. He’s worried that Connie’s fragile health won’t survive the commotion of a TV crew and an intense 60 Minutes interview session. Connie – with Dean’s help – puts on a brave face and convinces Marcel that she is feeling much better, good enough, in fact, that he should allow 60 Minutes to come to the house.
Marcel’s inextinguishable determination is the real strength of the movie. Marcel, through Nanna Connie, Dean, and everything that he learns over the course of the movie, imparts the lesson to every kid watching – and probably reminds most of the adults watching, too – that life is about being brave enough to do the hard things. It’s about being brave especially when you’re sad, or scared, or you plain don’t know what to do. That’s a wonderful lesson for kids to learn, and it’s a needed refresher for grownups, too.
Why it got 4 stars:
- I purposely didn’t use the phrase “the movie we need right now” because I think I’ve used it to describe approximately 75 movies since I started writing film criticism. Marcel the Shell with Shoes On is, however, probably the most deserving of that description of all the movies I’ve recently seen. It is charming, heartwarming, and it helps you forget for 90 precious minutes what a dumpster fire our world is at the moment.
Things I forgot to mention in my review, because, well, I'm the Forgetful Film Critic:
- One of the funniest lines of the movie (from Marcel): “If I was somebody else, I would really be enjoying this.”
- Another moment that got a big audience reaction: When Lesley Stahl asks Marcel how long it’s been since he’s seen his family. Marcel’s answer, “I couldn’t tell you, but the space in my heart gets bigger and louder every day,” is followed up with a hilariously straightforward answer from Dean, who chimes in with, “That’s two years.”
- I realized that I never mentioned Nick Paley, who is the third credited screenwriter for Marcel. Oops. Sorry, Nick!
- Shout out to the great Andy Richter, who has, maybe, three lines as Marcel’s dad, Mario.
- And now we come to the one reservation I have about Marcel, and that’s the aforementioned Lesley Stahl cameo. I am immediately suspicious any time a journalist appears in a piece of entertainment. I equate it with celebrities doing endorsements. Does Jay Leno need the money so badly that he needs to shill for Doritos? As the late, great Bill Hicks once said, “You do a commercial [as a celebrity], you’re off the artistic roll call forever…everything you say is suspect, and every word that comes out of your mouth is now like a turd falling into my drink.” This goes double for trusted journalists. If you parlay your career of reporting facts and speaking truth to power into a movie or TV show appearance, I’m wary of you. This goes triple for Brian Williams.
Close encounters with people in movie theaters:
- I saw Marcel on the closing day of the 2022 Oak Cliff Film Festival. I was able to get to six screenings in five days for the OCFF. It was a packed house for this screening and the energy from the crowd was electric. The movie is currently playing the festival circuit and was released in select theaters on the 24th of June.