The Three Sisters

Bluesky

A surprising choice for one of this year’s Oscar nominations, The Three Sisters has been praised for its simple yet elegant hand-drawn animation and its quirky humour, but there’s not a lot to it. It follows three sisters who live in three houses on a dome-shaped island. When misfortune leaves them needing additional income, two of them decide to move in together and rent out the empty property. A sailor moves in. At first they are appalled by him, but soon they are competing for his attention. For all its playfulness, the story proceeds to a predictable conclusion.

It is a film with pedigree, but that wasn’t apparent to Academy voters, as director Konstantin Bronzit (previously nominated for 2014’s We Can’t Live Without Cosmos) felt it would be fairer if we submitted it under a pseudonym, only revealing his identity when voting was complete. It was a noble gesture which also allowed him to feel a greater thrill at its success, which would seem to suggest that the film came through on its merits. That said, many viewers will find themselves uncertain as to just what those merits are. Don’t let the Oscar interest persuade you to keep sitting there are and waiting for a revelation, because none is forthcoming.

The characters are pleasing enough: sympathetic and amusing, if not very deep. The animation is beautiful in its way. The story is amusing, but not massively so. It’s too slow. In seeking to convey the boredom that the women feel before the sailor arrives, Bronzit risks boring viewers too. The best bits centre around the mischievous seagulls who live on the roof. Sadly, we don’t get enough of them.

Is this a masterpiece of subtlety and sophistication, or is it just a bit empty? Beyond the over-stretched story, nothing really stands out as wrong with it. It just doesn’t have anything to say, and whilst a film doesn’t need to have a moral or political message, it needs to be a lot more interesting than this to get away with not having a point.

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