My experience of watching Michael Dudok de Wit’s The Red Turtle was not what I expected. A fairytale, expressed in hand-drawn animation, had seemed like a pleasant enough prospect. I was not ready to have my emotional life reflected back to me.

Normally I’m not the last guy out of the cinema. I don’t consider myself a particularly ‘emotional’ person. But on this day, with this film, I found myself with my head in my hands, as the credits rolled, crying in the dark.

What happened? To deconstruct the film or my experience of it with cool, detached rationality would be like dissecting a joke; under the microscope it becomes lifeless. I cannot point you to any constituent part that explains its impact. But my experience of this film, I think reveals something of the power of art as a means of storytelling.

The arts have a language of their own. Beautiful art seems to connect with us on a profound level, bypassing language. Art evokes powerful responses in us, often before the ‘rational’ parts of our brains have caught up and wrapped words around our experience.

Perhaps, film articulates our own desires back to us: for intimacy, freedom, purpose, redemption … Ultimately, we love to celebrate characters that achieve these things and become more ‘fully alive’ as a result; we vicariously share in their triumph. Or perhaps we watch, with horror, those cautionary tales of characters who end up more like the ‘living dead’ as we wonder if they could have been us. Good films open up parts of our own stories that have long been buried; or perhaps desires we did not even know were there.

I find it helpful having a few questions in mind when responding to a film. I tend to steer away from the ‘technical’ aspect of films (though I love this too). Instead I try to open up a conversation (with myself or with others) around the points of connection a film has made with me directly; provoking responses that are personal before they are ‘academic’.

May your film watching be full of evocative experiences and truthful discoveries. The Red Turtle might be a good place to start? Usually I pick 2 or 3 questions from the suggestions below, and see where the conversation goes.

• • What struck you from the film? 
  • Which character did you like most / least?
  • Did any characters grow or change through the film? What caused this?
  • What was the film suggesting about what it means to be more fully alive?
  • What do you think would happen next in the story?
  • What questions do you have?
  • Why do you think the film has the title it has?
  • Which scene do you think will stay with you?
  • What ‘themes’ are in the film?

Tim, April 2019

*Image & video posted for non commercial purposes
under 'fair use' of copyright material in recommendation of the film

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