''My Life as a Courgette'' (french: Ma vie de Courgette; also titled ''My Life as a Zucchini'' in North America and Australia) is a 2016
stop-motion
Stop motion is an animated filmmaking technique in which objects are physically manipulated in small increments between individually photographed frames so that they will appear to exhibit independent motion or change when the series of frames i ...
animated
Animation is a method by which still figures are manipulated to appear as moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited on film. Today, most anim ...
comedy-drama
Comedy drama, also known by the portmanteau ''dramedy'', is a genre of dramatic works that combines elements of comedy and drama. The modern, scripted-television examples tend to have more humorous bits than simple comic relief seen in a typical ...
film directed by
Claude Barras
Claude Barras (born 1973) is a Swiss director, producer, and writer.
Barras was born in Sierre, Switzerland. He studied illustration and computer graphics at Emile Cohl School in Lyon and 3D infographics at ECAL. He then received a degree in an ...
,
and co-written by
Céline Sciamma
Céline Sciamma (; born 12 November 1978) is a French screenwriter and film director. She is especially known for her films Girlhood (film), ''Girlhood'' (2014), ''My Life as a Courgette'' (2016), and ''Portrait of a Lady on Fire'' (2019), winni ...
. It was screened in the
Directors' Fortnight
The Directors' Fortnight (french: Quinzaine des Réalisateurs) is an independent selection of the Cannes Film Festival. It was started in 1969 by the French Directors Guild after the events of May 1968 resulted in cancellation of the Cannes festiv ...
section at the
2016 Cannes Film Festival
The 69th Cannes Film Festival was held from 11 to 22 May 2016. Australian director George Miller was the President of the Jury for the main competition. French actor Laurent Lafitte was the host for the opening and closing ceremonies. On 15 Marc ...
.
This is the second adaptation of Gilles Paris' 2002 novel ''Autobiographie d'une Courgette'', as there was a French live-action
television film
A television film, alternatively known as a television movie, made-for-TV film/movie or TV film/movie, is a feature-length film that is produced and originally distributed by or to a television network, in contrast to theatrical films made for ...
adaptation called ''C'est mieux la vie quand on est grand'' which aired in 2007.
Despite it was a
box-office bomb
A box-office bomb, or box-office disaster, is a film that is unprofitable or considered highly unsuccessful during its theatrical run. Although any film for which the production, marketing, and distribution costs combined exceed the revenue after ...
, the film received extremely positive reception from critics, with many praising the film's visual aesthetic, emotional depth, and sympathetic characters. It won
Best Animated Film
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
and
Best Adapted Screenplay
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
at the
42nd César Awards
The 42nd César Awards ceremony, presented by the Académie des Arts et Techniques du Cinéma, was held on 24 February 2017, at the Salle Pleyel in Paris to honour the best French films of 2016. Jérôme Commandeur hosted the César Awards ceremo ...
. At the
89th Academy Awards, it was nominated for the
Best Animated Feature Film
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
and was selected as the Swiss entry for the
Best Foreign Language Film
This is a list of categories of awards commonly awarded through organizations that bestow film awards, including those presented by various film, festivals, and people's awards.
Best Actor/Best Actress
*See Best Actor#Film awards, Best Actress#F ...
at the 89th Academy Awards, making the December shortlist.
Plot
Set in Switzerland in the 2010s, Icare lives with his mother who has become an alcoholic after Icare's father abandoned their family. One day when his mom comes after him in a drunken rage, Icare accidentally pushes her down the stairs, causing her death. Later on, Icare makes a deposition to Police Officer Raymond. He informs him that he prefers to be called "Courgette", his mother's nickname for him. As mementos, he keeps one of his mom's beer cans and a kite he made with a drawing of his father as a superhero.
Raymond brings Courgette to an orphanage. Simon, one of the kids there, initially picks on Courgette and tries to force him to say what happened to his parents. After a fight over the kite, Simon warms up to Courgette and explains that he's the one who knows about all the kids' backgrounds. He then points out the backstories of the other kids, whose parents are either deceased or, as in Simon's case, in trouble with the law. Courgette then tells him about what happened to his own mother.
One day, a new girl named Camille arrives and Courgette develops a crush on her at first sight. Simon and Courgette sneak a look at her files and find that she had witnessed her father murder her mother for cheating on him, and then kill himself. Camille does have a living aunt, but she is a spiteful woman who wants custody of Camille only for the money she'll get in taking her in. Courgette and Camille start to bond during an overnight vacation at a snow resort, where he refashions his mom's beer can into a toy boat for her.
Courgette grows close to Officer Raymond as he regularly sends letters and drawings to him. Raymond plans to spend a holiday with Courgette, on the same weekend that Camille is supposed to spend with her aunt. Camille stows away in Raymond's car instead. Raymond reluctantly agrees to bring both kids to the outing. The three have fun at an amusement park and return to Raymond's house, where Raymond reveals that he has a son that never talks to him. Camille's aunt suddenly appears and angrily takes Camille away.
A few weeks later comes the custody meeting with the judge. There, Camille reveals that Simon had snuck an
MP3 player
A portable media player (PMP) (also including the related digital audio player (DAP)) is a portable consumer electronics device capable of storing and playing digital media such as audio, images, and video files. The data is typically stored o ...
into her toy boat that she's used to record her aunt insulting her mom and yelling at her. The aunt loses her temper at Camille right in front of the judge, destroying her bid for custody.
Raymond finally decides to take both Courgette and Camille in as foster children. Simon is initially angry, but he ultimately coaxes a reluctant Courgette to go with Raymond. Raymond takes some group photos of the kids before he leaves with Courgette and Camille. While living with Raymond, Courgette still writes letters to the kids at the orphanage, maintaining that he, Camille and Raymond are people that still love them all. Courgette now keeps a group photo of the kids on his kite.
Cast
Reception
Critical response
The film has a rating of 99% on
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...
, based on 137 reviews, with an average rating of 8.20/10. The site's critical consensus reads, "''My Life as a Zucchini''s silly title and adorable characters belie a sober story whose colorful visuals delight the senses even as it braves dark emotional depths." On
Metacritic
Metacritic is a website that review aggregator, aggregates reviews of films, TV shows, music albums, video games and formerly, books. For each product, the scores from each review are averaged (a weighted arithmetic mean, weighted average). M ...
, the film received a rating of 85 out of 100, based on 28 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".
Accolades
See also
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Notes
References
External links
GKIDS official site*
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{{DEFAULTSORT:My Life As A Courgette
2016 films
2016 animated films
2016 comedy-drama films
2016 directorial debut films
2016 independent films
2010s French animated films
2010s stop-motion animated films
Anifilm award winners
Animated comedy films
Animated drama films
Animated films about orphans
Animated films based on novels
Annecy Cristal for a Feature Film winners
Films based on French novels
French comedy-drama films
Films about orphans
French independent films
2010s French-language films
Swiss animated films
Swiss comedy-drama films
Swiss independent films
Films set in Switzerland
Films about dysfunctional families
French-language Swiss films
French adult animated films