Little Amélie or The Character of Rain

Amélie, a Belgian child in Japan, explores life with her companion Nishio-san. Her third birthday becomes a turning point, marking the beginning of life-altering events that shape her understanding of the world.

Review from The Hollywood Reporter

Scientists have proven that the human brain develops more rapidly from birth to the age of 5 than it does at any other time in one’s life. And yet when it comes to movies, there’s probably no other period harder to depict on screen. Films like Look Who’s Talking and The Boss Baby have certainly tried and, to an extent, succeeded in capturing the joys and chaos of infancy and toddlerhood. But they rarely manage to channel that age’s sense of discovery, mystery and terror.

In the charming new French animation flick Little Amélie or the Character of Rain (Amélie et la métaphysique des tubes), those feelings are front and center in a story that favors sensations over storytelling, plunging the viewer into the brain of a child waking up to the world around her for the first time. The twist, so to speak, in Maïlys Vallade and Liane-Cho Han’s feature debut, is that the child in question is a Belgian girl growing up in rural Japan in the 1960s — a place filled with countless natural wonders, but also marked by the scars of a major war that haven’t quite healed.

Adapted from the autobiographical novel by Amélie Nothomb (Fear and Trembling), the film feels at times like Terrence Malick meets Hayao Miyazaki for tykes, combining playful subjectivity with surreal flights of fancy. But it also maintains a narrative throughline that’s simple enough for any kid to follow, showing how its titular heroine literally emerges from her bubble to discover the pleasures and dangers of real life.

Read the rest of the review from Jordan Mintzer here...