Marcel the Shell With Shoes On was reviewed out of the SXSW Film Festival.
Marcel the Shell With Shoes On is acclaimed indie studio A24's first foray into family films, and it is a delightful time featuring a cute animated character that rivals the best of Disney's marketing-ready creations by way of a tranquil and meditative mockumentary film that has more in common with the works of Hayao Miyazaki and Isao Takahata than Christopher Guest. Though it gets a bit disjointed and aimless at times, it provides enough heart, laughs, and cute animated characters doing cute animated things to appeal to audiences of all ages.
Based on the 2010 shorts of the same name, Marcel the Shell With Shoes On follows Dean, played by director and co-writer Dean Fleischer-Camp, a man living in an AirBnb while he figures out his life. He is also an amateur documentarian, and when he discovers that his new residence is also inhabited by a shell, who, yes, has shoes on, and also a single googly eye, Dean decides to record its antics and upload them to the internet. What follows is essentially a mockumentary made out of dozens of short videos that Dean shot over the course of two years, as Marcel experiences life, fame, and also tries to find his lost family.
The first thing to know about Marcel the Shell With Shoes On is that it is very much a cute slice-of-life story, one without much of a plot or big cinematic moments. Though its titular shell (with shoes on) may look like a Pixar mascot, the story feels like a long-lost Ghibli film, one that is more interested in small, quiet moments. We follow Marcel as he explains the intricate systems he placed around the house to survive — and survive is the key word here, because it is abundantly clear that Marcel is barely hanging in there in a hostile environment, with ingenious solutions to simple problems, like using bread as a bed (and a couch), dipping his feet in honey and then walking up walls like Spider-Man to reach high places, or using a tennis ball to roll around the house (albeit blindly). The result feels very much like a distant cousin of the viral Lucas the Spider YouTube videos, which are equal parts aimless and meditative, but also super cute and marketable while exposing an inherent sadness within.
Indeed, Marcel — you know, the Shell, With Shoes On — may act all innocent and adorable, but there's pain there too. Most of the film involves him appreciating the small pleasures in life, like watching 60 Minutes and fanboying over Lesley Stahl, but he is also a young shell that has to take care of his grandma, and fend off against invading squirrels. The main storyline involves Marcel's quest to find his family, which he lost when the previous house owners had a big fight and got split up in the move. Marcel the Shell With Shoes On recognizes the importance of family and community, and it firmly places it as the single most important thing living beings need — not to survive, but to live.
And speaking of living, you will believe that a shell can have shoes on. The animation team really did a phenomenal job bringing Marcel to life in a seamless way. It is difficult to know for sure, just by watching the film, whether stop-motion or CG animation was used, and that is part of the charm of the character. Likewise, Fleischer-Camp employs a cinema verite style of documentary to capture Marcel's world in a way that feels completely real and believable, like you're catching a glimpse of a deeply personal story you would otherwise never hear about. This, of course, is in no small part due to Jenny Slate's work as co-writer and also as Marcel's voice. Slate informs the character with a sense of innocence that takes in everything around him earnestly, while also exposing very open emotional wounds with vocals alone.
Sadly, not everything is shellcellent. The individual scenes are adorable and funny, like a hilarious bit where Marcel goes on a rant about the redundancy of signing online comments saying "peace," because there's no way you'd openly sign off with a warmongering message. The problem is that it very much feels like a short film barely stretched to make a feature. It takes a while before the "plot" kicks in, and even then, it is still mostly a series of vignettes rather than a proper feature. That may not be a problem if you like watching 80-minute YouTube compilations, but don't come in expecting a tight narrative.
Still, it is hard to think ill of Marcel the Shell With Shoes On. As a family-friendly offering, it is a movie that people of all ages can enjoy, a winning move by the house that built Hereditary and The Lighthouse. As for the titular shell, don't be surprised to see enough overpriced merchandise to rival the adorable green baby without shoes on.
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