Jukai
2015 · 10m · France
Directed by Gabrielle Lissot
Genres: drama, experimental, fantasy
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, surreal
A pregnant woman follows a trail of colored threads into a dark forest to confront her fears about loss and motherhood.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
A pregnant woman chasing threads into a forest could've been Hallmark-adjacent dreck, but Lissot commits to the surreal without winking—the film stays genuinely *strange* instead of just sprinkling magical realism on maternal anxiety like it's a personality trait.
Lissot positions this squarely in the lineage of feminist experimental cinema—the forest as psychological space rather than literal geography—with a formal rigor that recalls early Chantal Akerman's durational approach to intimate dread.
The entire film hinges on Lissot's decision to let the colored threads *dictate* the cinematography rather than the reverse—the palette and framing submitting to the threads' logic rather than threading the logic into conventional shot composition—and that one structural choice transforms a personal fear-narrative into something genuinely disorienting.
Festivals
- Festival national du film d'animation de Bruz, Grand Prix
- Hong Kong International Film Festival 2017, Best Short Film
- London International Animation Festival 2016, Best Performance Award
- César Awards 2017, Pre-selected, Best Animated Short Film
- Clermont-Ferrand International Short Film Festival
- Hiroshima International Animation Festival
- Palm Springs International ShortFest