The charm of Marcel the Shell with Shoes On is that Marcel—a sentient, verbal, one-inch shell—is deeply human. And more than that, he is humanity at its best: confident but curious, vulnerable but resilient, empathetic and striving for connection.
The character Marcel was developed by Dean Fleischer Camp and Jenny Slate in 2010 when Slate began speaking in a funny voice to complain of their cramped travel accommodations. Fleischer Camp and Slate decided that the funny voice belonged to a character named Marcel, a tiny shell with one eye, one mouth, and two shoes. The duo began creating short stop-motion films of Marcel, which they posted to YouTube to millions of views.
The plot of the movie mirrors some of this history, but instead of inventing Marcel, Fleischer Camp (portraying Dean, an amateur film maker) discovers Marcel (voiced by Slate) in an Airbnb. Dean films Marcel and uploads the videos to YouTube, where they collect millions of views.
In this comedy/mockumentary (which premiered in 2021 before its wider release in 2022), Dean’s documentary follows Marcel as he strives to “not just survive, but have a good life” after he and his elderly grandmother have been forcibly separated from the rest of their family and community. Left to fend for themselves, Marcel and his Nanna Connie (voiced by the delightful Isabella Rossellini) find creative ways to feed, shelter, and entertain themselves. Marcel sleeps between slices of bread (in his “breadroom”), keeps a stockpile of peanuts and raisins, and navigates long distances within the house from within a rolling tennis ball. The incredible blend of live action film and meticulous stop-motion animation by Kirsten Lepore supports Slate’s whimsical vision that children may be able to imagine that they have a Marcel living in their own home.
A poignant theme of the film is the role and limitations of online communities in fostering connection. While promoting this film, Slate appeared on the Recess Therapy web series, where she and the series’ host Julian Shapiro-Barnum interviewed young children about themes relevant to the movie. In response to a question from Shapiro-Barnum, one young child explains that “community” means “a lot of things, like internet.” In the film, as Dean posts videos of Marcel online to tens of millions of people, the internet provides Marcel a sense of community. Marcel is moved by the countless comments on his videos, imitations, and professions of love. After Dean teaches Marcel to navigate YouTube, Marcel recreates simple science experiments he sees online, such as popping popcorn through a magnifying glass and launching a paper lantern. Based on experiences such as these, Marcel observes, “[T]here are all these people, and we’re all looking at the same thing, and we’re all doing the same thing. It’s beautiful…”
Earlier this week, I showed my mom the viral Recess Therapy video of Shapiro-Barnum interviewing a boy who loves corn. At the time of this writing, that video has 6.8 million views. Incredulous of my claim that “everyone knows about the corn kid,” my mom asked her friends and coworkers. With few exceptions, the people she spoke with not only were familiar with the corn kid video, but loved it and were delighted to talk about it. It’s truly beautiful that a video of a kid talking about a cereal grain can create a common shared and joyful experience for millions of strangers around the world. As this and Marcel both demonstrate, the internet not only documents shared experiences but also facilitates new ones.
But of course, posting for an online audience and consuming content others post for an online audience is not a formula for genuine connection. To help Marcel reunite with his family, Dean orchestrates a livestream during which Marcel asks his followers to help locate the man who (unwittingly) packed up his family and took them away. Millions tune in, but Marcel’s optimism is short-lived. Viewers use the information Marcel provides not to help him find his family, but to locate his house and film TikTok videos in front of it. The attention is obnoxious, but more so, it is a threat to Nanna Connie’s health. Having learned that none of the people who post that they “love” him have any interest in helping him, Marcel asks Dean to take the videos offline.
The exciting chain of events that eventually lead Marcel to his family involves a 60 Minutes interview segment, an international flight, and a sock drawer bunker. When Marcel eventually reunites with his family and community, it is because of Dean’s help.
Through one lens, the movie is the story of Marcel looking for, and eventually reuniting with, his family. This story begins with Marcel isolated and lonely, performing for an audience, and ends with him sitting in an audience among his family and friends. Through another lens, the movie is the story of Dean, isolated and lonely, opening up and forming a friendship with Marcel. This story begins with Dean’s insisting that he remain exclusively behind the camera, declining to share anything about his life with Marcel, and ends with Dean’s positioning a camera on a tripod facing a mirror, to capture him giving Marcel a tour of his new home while answering Marcel’s questions about his personal life. The development of this authentic human connection—or, um, human/shell connection—is the heart of this truly heartwarming film.
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