La sirène

With death closing in on him quickly, an elderly monk regales to his novice a story of his youth. It was the height of winter with snow and ice everywhere when he spotted a young girl floating in the river. He manages to drag her out then goes to fetch her some warm clothing. Upon his return he finds she has gone. Many months later, he is fishing when she pays him a more lively visit and they fall in love - but his own elderly master is watching over him and so, well... With Jacob's ladder bringing the short story to an end, what did actually happen to our would-be couple? Culminating in a threatening storm sequence, there is much religiosity to this story with many of the animations of the older characters looking like they'd been drawn by Michelangelo. Dark and grainy images, this time augmented by some powerful audio, make for a compelling ten minutes of drama from Aleksandr Petrov.

The narrative in Mermaid is somewhat muddled. The old monk has what must be considered a flashback 1/4 of the way through the film and then a dream 3/4 through, and frankly I'm a bit at a loss to try to explain either. Generally Petrov's storytelling is considered somewhat pedantic, despite or perhaps because he works entirely with literary adaptations, necessitating sometimes difficult omissions. Yet it's his art that he is famous for, and that is firmly on display in Mermaid. He is the most accomplished practitioner of a unique medium —he animates using oil paint on glass, using 2-to 3 layers to add depth to the images, animating new plates as the finished ones dry. It is a meticulous, yet beautiful technique that has won him much acclaim—3 previous Oscar nominations, including the win in 1999 for his adaptation of Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea. That film was a huge technical step forward as he adapted his style to the unforgiving IMAX format with the help of the Canadian production house Pascal Blais.

While Mermaid did not win, it likewise was nominated for the Oscar in 1996. Mermaid is in some ways the perfection of Petrov's original technique before money, improved technology, and production teams lead to Old Man and the Sea and My Love. Indeed it was the success of Mermaid that enabled Petrov to receive the kind of corporate patronage that allowed those films to happen.

There is not anything admirable about this short except the unique animation style. The story ,like everyone says, is hard to follow. Some scenes are beautiful, like the storm and flowing water. It's beautiful but vague (or the other way around ). The story has nothing new, the it's not about the story but the style.

Watch it for it's style only.

a perfect film. seems be a too large definition but it has all pieces for be more than wonderful animation, pure Aleksandr Petrov high work but a magnificent story who remember the Russian mythology, the air of Orthodox Church,who presents , in wise manner, the temptation and the love in its so different nuances as not exactly as show but as touching source of love sense. it has the gift to impress in a profound manner. to give a form of beauty who could be not just aesthetic but perfect lesson about important things. it seems be enough - it is one of Aleksander Petrov short animation. but, like each of his films, it is not only animation. maybe a testimony about force and delicacy, about heart and fascination of existence. presented after a work who could be , for many from us, unrealistic, a sacrifice itself.

As somebody who's very fond of Russian animation, Rusalka(aka Mermaid) has to be one of the most beautiful and fascinating of any Russian animated film or short. The high point is the animation, it is hard to put into words how truly gorgeous it is, not only is an animation style unlike any seen before in animation(oil paints on glass) but every frame and movement flows so smoothly it's almost dream-like. There is so much atmosphere in the setting, and the vast details and the way the colours are used were a visual feast. The music is soothing, almost like it's coming from a distance, and wisely sparingly used, while the sound effects are truly evocative and add so much to that magical dream-like effect. While it is understandable why anybody would have difficulty following the story(particularly if you are unfamiliar with the Slavic folklore tale it's based on), it wasn't a problem for me and the hauntingly gentle mood conveyed in the short is really to be admired, while the ending was incredibly poignant and stayed with me for a while after. The characters are very well drawn and expressively characterised(facial expressions and gestures rather than vocal, particularly good in this regard was for Rusalka) and carry Rusalka beautifully. In conclusion, a breathtaking Russian short film. 10/10 Bethany Cox