Memoir of a Snail: Movie Review

Vocal cast: Sarah Snook, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Eric Bana, Dominique Pinon, Jacki Weaver, Magda Szubanski
Director: Adam Elliott

Developed over an 8 year period, director Adam Elliott (of Mary and Max fame) has gone for the extremely maudlin in his latest, the stop-motion animated Memoir of a Snail.

A dark slice of storytelling, it focuses on twins Grace and Gilbert (Snook and Smit-McPhee) whose childhoods are destroyed by the loss over years of their parents. First, their mother via childbirth and later their father (played with meta edges by Delicatessen's Dominique Pinon) - the circumstances of which are tragic to say the least.

Separated by child services, Grace ends up alone whereas Gilbert is carted off and placed with a family whose religious fervour is devoted to an apple and whose brutality goes against everything in the Bible.

To say more about how Memoir of a Snail plays out is to rob you of the experience of one of the most singularly depressing films of the year. Unending misfortune pours from the screen, in the kind of movie that if it were human actors portraying, would be swamped in plaudits.

But Elliott's less interested in pandering to that side of things, choosing instead to craft a story around its ethos that life can only be lived forwards - much like a snail winding its way to its destination. Grief, depression, self-worth and trauma all feature heavily in this, a portrait of what could truly break a human spirit.

Yet there's equally love pouring from every cell on the screen, as Elliott stakes his claim as the maestro of misery in Memoir of a Snail. By tapping into the isolation people feel through their lives, and washing it through a cinematic prism.

Snook's subdued turn as Grace makes matters even more heartbreaking, a mournful melancholic tone washing through every word. While there's perhaps an argument that the ending itself is not real, the note on which it ends appears to be perfect for those seeking resolution.

Bleak and occasionally brilliant among the brutality of life on show, Memoir of a Snail is the heart-tugger you didn't know you wanted - or needed.