A man is thrashing about in an angry sea, trying to stay alive after, probably, a shipwreck. Waking up on the shore of a small island, he finds himself stranded amidst bugs, sea lions and hermit crabs. He runs through a forest and nearly drowns again after he falls off a steep cliff.
Determined to get off the island, he hauls logs from the forest to the beach, crafting a makeshift raft and sets out to sea. But something bashes the rickety boat from below, destroying it and sending the man back to the island.
So begins “The Red Turtle,†a rich animated film from a French-Belgian team led by director Michael Dudok de Wit that joined up with Japan’s Studio Ghibli to create the gorgeous hand-drawn images that are the setting for the deeply touching story.
Yes, “The Red Turtle†initially looks like an animated take on, say, “Cast Away.†But the man, who is not named doesn’t have Wilson, the volleyball, and, beyond a few unintelligible screams, doesn’t speak at all. In fact, there is no dialogue whatsoever in the 80-minute picture -- a device that works perfectly as the movie attracts with its imagery and its richly imagined story.
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To say much more about that story would spoil the picture. But it’s fair to add that there’s some magical realism involved and that the man isn’t the only character in the picture.
It’s also not giving too much away to say that the movie is the study of a man finding himself in and adapting to a new environment.
At first haunted by nightmares -- we see his dream of flying away from the island only to be thwarted and come crashing back to the beach -- he begins to find a way to live there, crafting, for example, a pair of pants out of the hide of a sea lion he finds dead on the beach.
And as we watch him age, as evidenced by his growing beard, we see him going through the stages of life in a wordless world.
“The Red Turtle†is never less than captivating, first by the animation, which is dynamic and realistic, and progressively, by the deeply human, slowly unfolding story.
That pace might make the picture a little too slow for the youngest viewers -- and there’s some genuine sadness at the natural conclusion of the film. But beyond that, it’s a picture for all ages and, because it has no dialogue, an international film that’s accessible to all.
“The Red Turtle†is nominated for the Academy Award for Best Animated Film. It won’t win -- the little statuette will go to one of Disney’s entries in the category on Sunday.
But it’s the best of the bunch, by far -- a profoundly moving film that would have been close to the top of my best of 2016 if it had played here last year.