A même le sol
2022 · 6m · France
Directed by Lucie Dupeyrat, Nathan Ygouf, Chirag Paul, Marine Sauvageot, Claire Savoye, Jade Astoux
Genres: animation, coming-of-age, drama
Tones: contemplative, tender, whimsical
While moving house, Lily, an ambitious and bubbly young woman, meets Édi, a shy homeless man, and Bélix, his cheerful dog. Curious about the duo, she grows attached to them and tries to help them off the streets, without realising how much she has already given them.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A six-person animation collective making a film about a young woman's charity toward the homeless—sounds like exactly the earnest, consensus-approved premise I'd normally skip, except the reversal in the final beat (she's given *them* more than vice versa) is genuinely subversive about saviorism in a way most films won't risk.
The collaborative methodology here—six directors working in animated form on a tender coming-of-age narrative—situates itself in a lineage of European co-directed shorts that prize formal restraint and emotional clarity; the whimsy never overwhelms the contemplative architecture.
What makes this work is the decision to center the dog's presence as emotional ballast rather than mascot—Bélix becomes the gravitational object around which both Lily's ambition and Édi's dignity orbit, and that single casting choice reframes the entire power dynamic of the story.