There is perhaps a rule in the critics’ handbook that bans watching kids’ films in the company of actual children. But, like other parents doing a childcare-free summer, needs must. So I sat the toddler down in front of this French animated tale about two ladybirds cast away on a Caribbean island.
It has no dialogue and animated by inserting quite basic CG bugs into a backdrop of live photography. An absence of smart-alec seagulls and jetpack-propelled poodles led me to fear mutiny after a few minutes. But the film’s gentle magic worked a treat.
The story follows a daring young ladybird who becomes trapped inside a cardboard box at a factory while escaping an army of red ants. When the box is loaded on to a plane for Guadeloupe, the ladybird’s father stows on board.
The bug animation – simple bodies and black-dot eyes – is miraculously expressive, a little flutter of wings communicating the ladybird dad’s anxiety. And directors Hélène Giraud and Thomas Szabo play with scale beautifully – in the factory, a roll of masking tape wheels along the floor like a deadly boulder to squish an ant, Indiana Jones-style.
The film is a sequel to Minuscule: Valley of the Lost Ants (2013), itself based on a popular French TV show. Giraud and Szabo have nailed the formula with lovely buzzy bug vocals and a wonderfully inventive soundscape. What would a spider web sound like to a ladybird caught on one of its sticky spokes – like the twang of metal wire, of course.
It feels a little overstretched. The toddler drifted off eventually, but kept with it for 50 minutes – a personal best.
