Recently receiving top awards at the Palm Springs International ShortFest, winning the Best of the Festival Award, “The Old Young Crow” cemented its rather successful festival run this year, as it screened all over the world netting a number of accolades
“The Old Young Crow” review is part of the Submit Your Film Initiative
The movie begins with a rather impressive frame, where we watch a man (just his hands actually) placing a diary of sorts on a table, before beginning his narration of how his family moved from Iran to Tokyo, after his mother passed. The pages of the diary soon come alive on screen, presenting images drawn through minimal animation, with the sound connecting the images with the narration. Evidently, the images are the first impressions of Tokyo, with the focus soon changing to food, through images of various bento.
After an intro regarding the movie, which actually becomes part of the artform here, also informing us that the story presented is that of Mehrdad, the combination of live action, presentation of the diary drawings along with animation and narration continues, through a rather fast pace that actually works quite good for the movie.
The loneliness Mehrdad felt as a child in a strange country permeates the narrative through all the aforementioned aspects, with his fascination with crows also becoming quite evident, as much as the time he spent in a graveyard. The pace then slows down a bit, in order to introduce us to Chiyo, an old lady Mehrdad befriends in the graveyard, with the two bonding over her loss of her son. Soon the boy is invited to her house, with her talking about the loss of Chiharu, with the images in the diary taking a darker turn as death comes to focus, along with the similarities the protagonist shares with the deceased. The impact the acquaintance has on both soon becomes quite apparent, but eventually, loss becomes a factor once more, in surreal fashion.
Liam LoPinto directs a very tender short, which thrives both in context and art form. Regarding the first aspect, the way the elder lady and the young boy connect, over their common loss and the need to fill the gap it left in their lives (Chiyo with a son and Mehrdad with a mother) is one of the most appealing traits, which the filmmaker turns over its head by adding a supernatural element that also works quite well here. Furthermore, the concept of loss and grief and how finding “company” with similar experiences can help in that regard becomes apparent too, along with the differences and similarities of the Japanese and Iranian cultures, which conclude the rather rich context here.
Regarding the artform, the way LoPinto combines all the different elements in his hands (animation, live-action, drawings, narration and the music) results in a truly impressive amalgam, whose quality is very rarely met in short films. With his own editing being one of the best aspects of the movie, the rather fast pace emerges as utterly fitting, also in the way the music occasionally dictates it, in a way, though, that does not distract from the main comments, but actually adds to their presentation.
“The Old Young Crow” is an excellent short, one that is equally impressive both in context and artform, in an effort that definitely deserves all the success it has received so far.
