My Life as a Zucchini

Composite Score: 86.43

Starring: Gaspard Schlatter, Sixtine Murat, Paulin Jaccoud, Michel Vuillermoz, Raul Ribera, Estelle Hennard, Elliot Sanchez, Lou Wick, Brigitte Rosset, Monica Budde, and Adrien Barazzone

Director: Claude Barras

Writers: Céline Sciamma, Claude Barras, Morgan Navarro, and Germano Zullo

Genres: Animation, Comedy, Drama, Coming of Age

MPAA Rating: PG-13 for thematic elements and suggestive material

Box Office: $5.87 million worldwide

My take on Watching This Film:

                My Life as a Zucchini is the stop-motion animated film directed by Claude Barras and written by Céline Sciamma about a boy who goes to live at an orphanage after his mother dies when falling down the attic stairs at their home. The film is based on Gilles Paris’s novel Autobiographie d’une Courgette and was nominated for the Oscar for Best Animated Film. The film follows Icare “Courgette” as he settles into his life at the orphanage and learns about the various intricacies of his fellow orphans’ plights. We get to watch as Courgette and the other children form a found family of sorts as they band together to withstand the injustices that life has thrown their way. Eventually, Courgette falls in love with one of the new girls who has come to the orphanage, named Camille, and begins to work on a way to ensure that they can stay together even as external forces seem to be pulling them apart.

                The film is beautifully animated with a unique art style that could come from no other film, and it works to remind the audience of the youth of its subjects while the story itself takes on some rather mature themes. It might be slightly too heavy for a “kids’” movie, but it definitely feels appropriate for children aged ten and up, so long as you’re willing to engage them in conversations about what happens. There’s good humor, a powerful look at growing up, and a beautiful examination of friendship and the family that we form as we come of age and experience life alongside others.

                My Life as a Zucchini brilliantly portrays its coming-of-age story with stellar writing and strikingly unique animation, earning a spot among the greats along the way. While its themes might feel more mature than its animation, it does serve as a stark reminder of the realities facing the young people of the world today and offers a poignant opportunity for conversation if you invite them to watch it with you. Currently, you can stream this film via the Criterion Channel if you’d like to check it out.