Pachyderme

It’s an innocent question: “What could happen to you there?” Many people would think the same of the grandfather’s comment when Louise is about to go for a swim, but doesn’t have her costume: “No-one will mind.” To some people, however, these remarks are indelibly associated with terror, and Stéphanie Clément’s short film is for them.

Shortlisted for a 2024 Best Animated Short Film Oscar, the film breaks rules from the start. There’s an image of an empty swing, an unfortunate cliché in such a strong piece of work, but the golden light illuminating it invites us to expect a happy, cherished childhood memory, and that warm, soft quality never goes away. As such it helps to emphasise the fact that bad things can happen in any setting, and that a middle class white child staying in an idyllic country location doesn’t have any guarantees of safety. Light is used throughout in a way which feels very personal and specific. Daytime is a threat because it can mean trips to the lake. In the dusk, there are trips to the forest “to listen to the animals.” But worst of all is firelight, and the orange glow which steal under the door of Louise’s room at night.

It is only by firelight that we see her grandfather’s face. In scene after scene, Louise looks down or straight ahead, never upwards, and we share her perspective. Adults are only partially present, lumbering shapes. Grandfather’s hands are prominent, the size of her whole forearm. Clément observes their use in small but potent ways. Resting on a shoulder. Drawing her to him. There is a sense of ownership, and of encasement, reflected when she’s sitting in the back seat of the car in the garage and the garage door slide down, reminding her that she is trapped.

There is yellow wallpaper in Louise’s room, which might be a reference. She tries to hide in the pattern. There is nowhere else to go. The animation perfectly captures the empty, hopeless look on her face, a deep sadness occasioned not only by her grandfather’s actions but, perhaps, by her aloneness, by the fact that nobody looks at her for long enough to see that something is wrong. She recalls a story about the lake being haunted and slides under the water as if seeking her own annihilation.

The pachyderm of the title refers to the unknown owner of a tusk displayed at the top of the stairs. It’s an object of terror itself, a stand-in for what she can’t face thinking about too directly. In the summer when the film is set, something will happen to reshape Louise’s life, but long, long afterwards, the tusk remains.