The House of Small Cubes

Gretings from Lithuania.

"Tsumiki no ie" (2008) is a very good short animated movie. The settings, plot are nothing short of amazing. This is a very sad and beautiful story about life, beautiful moments in our life which live only in our memories when time comes to the end. The idea behind this little picture is amazing. No wonder it won Oscar for the best short animated movie.

Overall, this is wonderful little gem that should be watched and appreciated by people who already lived and have some experience in their lives.

Its clear in the animation that the point of the story isn't the fact that the city is flooding. In my view, the water represents the past, what is flooded is buried in memory. As the old man ages he continues to build upwards to escape the water, which in that sense, represents life. When he drops the pipe, he goes into the water after it. By doing so, he has delved into the past. His pipe represents a sentimental emotion, and by going after it, relives his life from childhood into his present elderly state. The ending will represent, or at least it did to me, the fact that experiencing those emotions again has made him miss his (apparently) deceased wife, and is lonely. His child has reached adulthood and started a life of her own, so what now does he have left? To continue building (living) until he reaches the limit, and ultimately death, which is when there is no higher he can build up.

The House of Small Cubes felt a bit familiar, like I might've seen it before in either high school or during some university course, but I don't know for sure. It could just be that the visuals and colors reminded me of The City of Lost Children, and that felt familiar. But for a while, this short film also feels like it could be about forgetting things with age, so that's a bit sobering to not know if I remembered the whole thing or not.

But probably not. I think it's more about grief, and maybe memory but not so much in the sense of losing it, even if the voiceless and solitary protagonist is old. Or it could be an apocalyptic thing. The animation is visually pleasing but there's also something a bit unsettling about it all, with the isolation, and the fact that other people only appear in memories.

Maybe it'll stick with me for good this time, supposing I had seen it before some years ago. I'm not in love with the short, and can't shake the feeling that it was missing a little something that might've made it great, but there's still enough here to appreciate that watching it felt worthwhile.

Until this day I've never wanted to post a comment even on my favorite movies, but I could not help saying a word about this loveliest, brilliant little animation. When I watched it for the first time I had a feeling of warmth, serenity and happiness. I was happy that human beings can still create such beautiful things in this world. I am amazed at how the director managed to put so many feelings and thoughts in this tiny piece of animation and I want to thank Mr. Kunio Katô for doing that. My congratulations Mr. Katô, you've added a beautiful piece to the art of animation :) And at last but not least I want to mention the music of the movie, it PERFECTLY fits every inch of the film and creates a harmonious unity of sound and image. I hope you will enjoy watching La Maison en petits cubes as much as I did :)

A big man in the late part of his life, lives on the top floor of a multi-story house. He actually fishes through a trap door because water has risen so high that his cube is all that is above it. He drops his pipe and goes down in the water to find it. What he finds on the way down are emanations of his life and loves, wife, children, friends. When he tries to grasp the or touch them they disappear. These lower levels are gone forever, never to be reclaimed. But this is what we all face, if we are lucky. Wonderful memories of times we were happy or times we are sad or times we were scared. The music is so pretty and adds a soft touch to the delicate film.