A new writing segment, "Ten Items or Less" is an attempt to consciously cutback and restrict how much I write. I get ten sentences or less to discuss a movie. That's it. Let's see if some genius comes out of working around my self-made obstacle.
Kirikou and the Sorceress is an animated fable filtered through the sensibilities of pop art while staying true to the spirit of the folk tales it's indebted to. The film draws upon West African legend, and its abundance of irreverence sets it apart from the hero's journey of other animated films. Kirikou is a baby who gives birth to himself and sets about defeating the evil sorceress Karaba, who turns out be merely misunderstood rather than malevolent. More generally though the film is about the rhythms of village life with a fairy tale twist, and there's an episodic nature where the little moments of daily life are shown with an earnest and affectionate eye for detail. Kirikou is most importantly a joyous and whimsical film. It's idiosyncratically and deadpan funny, and sporadically filled with spontaneous musical numbers and colorful characters in a colorful environment, drawn with a flat, eye-popping color design. Like all good fables, the film has small events that stand in as bigger lessons, including growing up, doing the right thing, and being inquisitive. But the strongest is about ageism told, like all the film's messages, through eloquently precise, laconic aphorisms ("I want to be big" "And when you are big you'll want to be small") and digressive side quests. The film also has a pleasingly feminist undercurrent with Kirikou's mother and Karaba refusing to give into gender expectations. While Kirikou's story and its designs are simple, its messages are not. Though its quirky, its playfulness hides a darker sense of how the world sometimes can be mean and nasty for no other reason other than that life's unfair like that sometimes.
Grade: ★★★
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