La mue
2026 · 2m
Directed by Jaemin Kim
Genres: coming-of-age, drama, surrealism
Tones: contemplative, melancholic, tender
One night, during a call with his mother, a young man half-mentions solitude, passing time and a lobster he has brought home; in the closed space of its exoskeleton, the lobster attempts its molt, an uncertain instant between survival and failure, while the protagonist, living far from home, faces the possibility of his own transformation.
Picked by Zoe
The scouts
Everyone wants to read the metaphor about shedding skin and growing up—fine, whatever—but what really gets me is that Kim just *lets* the lobster be a lobster, unglamorous and struggling in its tank while the guy talks to his mom about nothing. That refusal to sentimentalize the symbol is the actual subversion here.
The formal restraint is exquisite: a two-minute study in negative space where the real transformation happens in what isn't said during that phone call, mirrored against the lobster's wordless biological ordeal. Kim situates himself in a lineage of lyric cinema that trusts the viewer to hold two fragile things at once.
The decision to keep the camera locked on the lobster's exoskeleton—watching it strain and fail and try again—while the mother's voice drifts in and out of focus: that single compositional choice transmutes a dorm-room scene into something that feels inevitable and unbearably tender on a shoestring.