Retiring to his quaint countryside home to enjoy the spring away from the chaos of Metropolitan Tokyo, director and stop-motion aficionado Yashiro lulls himself into a fascinating arboreal journey that takes him into the deep recesses of his imagination where he comes face to face with magic in plain sight.
Pukkulapottas and Hours in the Forest is streaming on JFF Theater until 2025/02/01 11:00:00 [JST]
The wizards behind the sorcery are mysterious fur-coat-decked Leprechaun-like creatures who are also the namesake of this incredibly aesthetic picture. They are the guardians of the forest who dart about with a flourish, nurturing wilting flowers in one scene and then, lo and behold, resting under the cooling shade in another. All done with a curious stone-faced unbothered expression plastered across their faces. A picture of pure Zen.
But these are no ordinary creatures, for in Takeshi’s mixed-media Claymation world, the ‘Pukkulapottas’ require a little fairy dust of imagination kindled by a capability to feel happiness, to make themselves appear in front of others. As the director succinctly chagrins, “Just because you cannot see them does not mean they are not there.”
This magic gradually lures Yashiro to set up tiny cameras around the forest to capture the erratic movement of the little knife-wielding figures as they go about their day, resulting in a whimsical twist to the found-footage genre.
What follows is a charming package of painstakingly rendered claymation sequences in a beautifully imagined world of fantasy and visuals backed by soothing folk music and narration (as narrated by Yashiro, who should consider doing mindfulness meditation videos) that immediately take you to a calmer dimension. Think “Fantastic Mr. Fox” (2009) by Wes Anderson but with a less grim and adult side, and you see some parallels between the two.
At its core, the delicate fruit of Yashiro’s countless hours spent in the forest has resulted in a picture that although thin on the storytelling front, still delivers a strong message with its child-like conviction and that is to have faith in ‘our heart’s antennae’.
With a little creativity and make-belief, one can make the dullest of retreats into the woods seem like a foray onto the yellow brick road of Oz. But trust that you slow down, enjoy the stay, be at a mindful peace with your surroundings and maybe… just maybe, you might encounter your version of Pukkulapottas too.
