Souvenir, souvenir

Animated doc short. An animation artist interviews family (and then animates the conversations) while trying to get his grandfather to talk about the French-Algerian war. The gorgeous, varying animation keeps you involved in the story and seems to paint a picture of a war that his grandfather might be trying to forget.

The basic virtue of this short animation remains the universal message ( and echo ) of story. A young man hopes to have the confessions of his grandfather about Algerian war. The venerable man reduces his stories to his mates and a gazelle. Nothing more. The stor told in a time of family dinner , about dark side of experiences is minimalized after.

And this is the best part. Because the silence of old man is the silence of people crossing a traumatic experience, as butcher or as victim, from the Shoah and the Goulag and the Pitesti experiment to wars .

Second, this silence, a sort of exorcism against terrible experiences , is first used in the relation with family.

Not the last, after so many books, artistic films, documentaries, edited documents , why the young director has need of the words of his grandfather ? The ansewer seems simple but it sounds not so easy.

In short, a special film, useful in profound sense.