Lu Over the Wall

Kai has moved with his father to a small fishing town and likes nothing about it. He makes music in his room and puts it online. Two classmates ask him into their band, and on the island where they rehearse a mermaid called Lu appears, who begins to dance when she hears music. The trouble is that the town believes the merfolk bring misfortune. Masaaki Yuasa directs. Yuasa's line is distinctive. Characters and objects change shape constantly, the movement is exaggerated and the physics is bent; few directors in Japanese animation draw this freely. The visual idea is water. The sea takes shape around Lu and moves almost as a character, a choice that uses what animation can do. Underneath the narrative is the town's economy. The fishing is gone, the young are leaving and the old are frightened of everything that comes from outside; the hostility to the merfolk is the direct counterpart of that fear. It won the Cristal, the top award, at the 2017 Annecy international animation festival. Its weakness is the script. The narrative is overcrowded, events accelerate in the last half hour and some characters are left unfinished. Who it is for: viewers who like Masaaki Yuasa and formally free drawing. Who it is not for: the story is familiar and scattered, the rhythm is uneven, and the visual density is tiring for some.