We are travelling back in time to the early 19th century on the south coast of England. This is where Mary Anning lives, a 12-year-old girl who is inquisitive, persistent and fascinated by fossils. She spends every free minute at the beach to look for the fossilised remains of long extinct animal species in the strata of her hometown’s coastal cliffs. Her father, too, is an enthusiast and earns a little extra for his family by selling fossils. When he disappears after the collapse of a cliff, Mary’s life is shaken. All that her father leaves behind is a mysterious drawing whose meaning Mary only gradually makes out. She is determined to uncover the secret together with unexpected allies. An entertaining and warm-hearted biopic about one of the first female palaeontologists.
A brilliant and highly poetic collection of tiny moving image moments which offers aesthetic delights through cleverly chosen camera angles, framing, lighting, montage and the materials used. This archive of trifles remains silent. The eyes begin to hear, the sound is generated in the mind. Simply enchanting.
Flocks of starlings are circling above the retirement home. These impressive natural spectacles are called murmurations because from a distance they sound like collective murmuring. Not everyone hears or sees them, but the old man notices. Sometimes the starlings send a single twittering messenger to his window. Often, the birds are more present to him than his fellow humans, more present than the old demented fellow resident who regularly waters a still life of flowers, more present than his neighbours in the amateur choir. And then it happens: The old man finds a first feather in his hair, then a second, then several. Soon he grows a beak so that instead of singing he can only caw.
The last phase of life we witness here is lovingly animated: The puppet animation was created with gauze bandages, a beautiful approach to the vulnerability that comes with aging. The farewell to life shown here is devoid of pathos, not even that over-produced grief we know from many narratives of dying. Even the retirement home is a completely mundane place, neutrally portrayed. Instead, we follow this feathered farewell as a quiet but growing alienation from the world, a no-longer-belonging. And one day we will all grow the wings that go with it.
