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La jeune fille sans mains (Sébastien Laudenbach) French animated film adapting the Grimm Brothers' fairy tale about a miller who inadvertently sells his daughter to the Devil in exchange for limitless riches. Like a lot of the Grimm fairy tales, the actual narrative elements of the film are horrific-- the Devil wants his young prize "dirty," so the father, keeping his promise to the Devil, traps her up a tree guarded by vicious dogs until she's soiled herself. However, since she's wiped away the tears from her eyes, her hands are too pure to be carried off to Hell, so the Devil makes the father chop her hands off... All of this is depicted in the film's wonderful elliptical art style, with every image looking like an unfinished sketch:















I gather from reading comments elsewhere online that this style is maddening for some, but for me it's obviously the film's raison d'être. This film was apparently singlehandedly illustrated by Laudenbach, and it bears a distinct charm by virtue of its style. At 75 minutes, it's about as long as this kind of experiment can sustain, and the narrative, while dark and grotesque (no need to dub this into English for kids, they'd probably be either bored or terrified if they got far enough into this), does not ask much more of us than to sit back and watch it unfold prettily. Shout quite unexpectedly put this out on Blu-ray, and it's def worth picking up, especially since they threw in a handful of shorts by the director as well.

domino harvey wrote: Sun May 20, 2018 2:29 pm La jeune fille sans mains (Sébastien Laudenbach)

Stupid search engine made this too difficult to find. Anyway, upon this recommendation I had to seek Laudenbach's work out and just want to also emphasize how wonderful the film is. It reminds me a bit stylistically and in terms of themes of Belladonna of Sadness or Takahata's ultimate film. Like those I'm sure this one will benefit a lot from rewatches where taking in the story will become easier to appreciate without the overwhelming power of the aesthetic. The film is of course quite sad (with the middle section actually being the part that got me the most), but its amazing the happiness Laudenbach affords his protagonist as well. She's a good person who without being Pollyannaish or simple minded retains a lot of positivity. The score as well is quite surprising. There's no attempt to make it sound old fashioned. It's actually quite a modern rock score in many respects and all the more enjoyable for it.

> La jeune fille sans mains

Looks like it is out on BluRay in Canada

Michael, that's just the US Shout Factory Blu-ray, no need to import from another country!

domino harvey wrote: Sun Aug 19, 2018 6:28 pm Michael, that's just the US Shout Factory Blu-ray, no need to import from another country!

I didn't find the Shout Factory BluRay -- need to improve my Googling skills obviously....

You have to search for the English translated title, the Girl Without Hands (Here it is on Amazon)

domino harvey wrote: Sun Aug 19, 2018 8:42 pm You have to search for the English translated title, the Girl Without Hands (Here it is on Amazon)

Too easy, I guess...

The Grimm story is pious, and gives the impression of Christian elements artificially grafted onto an essentially pagan tale. The film wisely keeps the Devil but drops the guardian angels and God stuff.

Those stills are beautiful, and prompted my purchase. If some find the style maddening, it may be the shimmery animation that bothers them. I loved it.