Margarethe 89
2023 · 18m · France
Directed by Lucas Malbrun
Genres: animation, drama, thriller
Tones: dark, provocative, surreal, tender
In Leipzig in 1989, a young punk named Margarethe is detained in a psychiatric hospital by the East German state after resisting the regime. Drugged and isolated, she clings to her love for a punk musician named Heinrich and dreams of breaking free before the Wall falls.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
Malbrun's decision to adapt Goethe's Gretchen through the lens of Stasi 'Zersetzung' tactics — and to render it entirely in felt-tip pen — places this firmly in the tradition of politically committed animation that refuses to aestheticize its subject, earning its Cannes Critics' Week selection.
Felt-tip Stasi psychiatric horror in Leipzig '89 — childlike medium against adult state violence is the kind of inversion that either devastates or curdles. Eighteen minutes is the test; I'm interested enough to take it.
Felt-tip pen as the rendering medium for Stasi psychiatric horror — the disconnect between childlike materials and totalitarian violence is exactly the kind of formal collision that, at 18 minutes about an East German punk, has real ideological bite. Bold tonal gamble.
Festivals
- Cannes Critics' Week 2023
- Annecy International Animation Festival 2023
- Odense International Film Festival 2023