Memoir of a Snail Review: LFF 2024

Tragicomedy Memoir of a Snail is brilliantly bonkers and genuinely heartwarming

In 1970s Australia, Grace (voiced by Succession’s Sarah Snook) narrates her melancholy tale of family woe to her pet snail Sylvia. Born with a cleft lip and an obsession with snail curios that sees her border on hoarding, Grace is an easy target for playground bullies. Yet she’s always protected by her fierce, pyromaniac twin brother Gilbert (Kodi Smit-McPhee.) When the twins are suddenly orphaned, they find themselves sent off to separate foster families on opposite sides of the country, with no guarantee of ever seeing each other again.

While Gilbert’s foster family are openly cruel, Grace’s are well meaning yet struggle to connect with their new, weird little daughter. Desperately missing her brother and with only her pet snails for company, Grace forms an unlikely friendship with 80-year-old local eccentric Pinky. As we follow Grace through bereavement, depression and abusive relationships; it’s Pinky who keeps bringing her back to the light. Memoir of a Snail’s excellent voice cast is rounded out by Jacki Weaver, Eric Bana and most bizarrely Nick Cave, who has a small role.

The latest from Oscar winning director and claymation animator Adam Elliot, Memoir of a Snail is his second feature film after 2009’s sleeper hit Mary and Max. Elliot’s visual style is incredibly distinctive, his scruffy, organically shaped characters belying backgrounds that are packed with detail and visual gags. Elliot’s worlds feel like those of a less goth but more grimy Tim Burton. His storytelling is deliciously oddball, yet this story also has a great deal of heart.

The brilliance of Memoir of a Snail is how deftly it switches between comedy and tragedy – not just from scene to scene, but often from line to line, and yet it never loses the emotional impact of either sentiment. As Grace goes through hardship after tragedy we view some genuinely crushing moments, but levity is never far off, with comedic beats and silly one liners always landing at precisely the right moment. The laughs flow easily and never feel forced or begged for.

The takeaway messages have all the hopeful simplicity of a family classic: keep moving forward, good times can always come back around, don’t let your own self-doubt hold you back – and with a few less sex jokes this film probably would be a very successful kids’ movie. As it has really rather a lot of sex jokes – and what must be the most puppet nudity ever put in a stop motion film – Memoir of a Snail has all the makings of an instant cult classic.

As outlandish as some of the plot points get (a religious family that pray to apples? A love interest with a disturbing fetish?!) Elliot says he and his film makers always tried to treat their puppets like real people, suffering real life issues – and that concern for telling a genuine human story really shines through in a piece that never becomes absurd even when it is at times quite silly.

You’ll be genuinely moved by this film about a girl obsessed with snails that somehow sandwiches existential philosophy and boob jokes. A big-hearted surprise of a puppet movie, Memoir of a Snail is a real delight and an honest crowd pleaser.

Memoir of a Snail is playing as part of the BFI London Film Festival 2024. It will be released in the USA on 25th October 2024 but wider UK release details have yet to be confirmed.