Charlotte

For a film about Jews during WWII, I thought I'd be more moved by the story. It just seemed kind of bland, shallow, and lifeless. Part of the problem is with the animation. These days, I guess we're a bit spoiled by the amazing and lifelike animation by studios like Disney and Pixar. The animation in Charlotte was very simple and seemed out of date. I also found the dialogue quite stilted and unemotional. Then there's the whole issue about her poisoning her grandfather. It was barely mentioned in the movie. Another reviewer mentioned that she admitted to killing him in 2015. Rather difficult since she died in a concentration camp in 1943. And that's another thing that was glossed over. Her dying at Auschwitz wasn't mentioned until the recap at the end of the film. Truthfully, I was relatively unmoved by this lifeless film.

"Charlotte" is a a daring film, dealing with importan and heavy topics. One can be thankful to the directors for that they dare to tell the story of a too easily forgotten artist, that I didn'tknow about before. Having it be animated seems like a good choice, considering Charlotte's world already exists in paintings.

But There are just SO many questionable artistic decisions!

Starting from the animation style that is rendering everything lifeless. Because it's not hand animated but seemingly just floating lines, from a to b. It was most obvious in some of the walking animation, but so many more to wonder about!

The many reoccurring Kissing scenes that where weirdly long and didnt work in this toonboom cutout animation style Then the super thick character lines? Who thought that was a good idea? Especially with the way the backgrounds looked?

And the writing & directing... going through plot points like it was the most unemotional roadmap. There where so many dramatic, heartbreaking moments with enormous potential! But it never seemed like anyone on the film team cared much for them, the was no sense that the directors emotionally connected to what they where showing.

The film was surely a great effort and I am thankful for having learned about Charlotte. The unusually high budget suggests that there must have been some unexpected twists and turns in the making of this film, since it doesnt translate to quality on the screen. I'm sure there's an other, very interesting story there about the making of this project. And someone tells this story one day because I'm eager to learn from the many undoubtedly interesting experiences in the making of this film.

The Holocaust was cruel and vicious. So was the real Charlotte Salomon who poisoned her grandfather. She admitted to killing him in 2015. This movie's animation is beautiful but it doesn't depict the truth. Art should depict some truth. That is one of it's functions.

EDIT: Charlotte Salomon's letters where she admitted killing her grandfather were released in 2015. Sorry for the confusion.

The producers and decision-makers who conceived this film made a serious error at the outset. This is not appropriate material for an animated film. It is understandable that a film about an artist would be look like art, especially since Charlotte Salomon is credited with having produced the first Graphic Novel. She produced hundreds of paintings about the events in her life as a young woman living in Germany as it was becoming an authoritarian hell for Jewish people. The animation is old fashioned and flat unlike what we have come to expect from Pixar, where the images and the characters are so fully developed. That kind of animation might have enhanced our experience of her life, but it would not solve the problem of animation. This is a heart-wrenching complex story about a woman who was complex and odd for her time or any time. Her family was consumed in unbelievable tragedy apart from the fact that so many of them were murdered in concentration camps. Animation is a step removed from life and this form of animation is wooden and stilted. The lives in Charlotte's story are highly emotional and such drama requires the services of excellent acting. We are too removed from the emotions and the reality of this story.

It means more that we love life than that life loves us.

The tragically beautiful true story of Charlotte Salomon, a courageous young Jewish artist who paints every moment of her life in a Chagallish, raw, and surreal style that foreshadows the arrival of graphic novels. "True art reveals the chaos inside us," says Charlotte. Her whimsical and provocative paintings of Berlin in the 1930s, Southern France during World War II, and the people she encountered, help her come to terms with trauma in her life that includes suicide, Nazis, betrayal, violence, splendor, and love. Sad moments are more truthful for Charlotte than happy ones. The artwork helps settle her nerves.

There is so much heartbreaking beauty in Charlotte that it is hard to know where to look; the luminous green necklace that she treasures from her mother, snowfall in Berlin that swirls through cruelty and fire, haunting premonitions, and more. Keira Knightley is the voice of the imaginative, insightful, and strong-willed Charlotte. Those who saw this film and rated it three and a half stars or less probably were looking for something else and did not appreciate the depth or how different it is from other World War II stories. I am mesmerized by this determined and insightful woman who lived life as best she could even with the viciousness and sadness whirling all around her, and despite knowing that it would consume her too sooner than later.

Seen at the Toronto international film festival.