Molly in Springtime
2009 · 26m · Canada
Directed by Pierre-Luc Granjon
Genres: animation, comedy, fantasy
Tones: theatrical, whimsical
At carnival in Balthasarville, scoundrel Bonifacio schemes to overthrow King Léon, but Molly Gingerbread and Hedgehog outsmart him and save the townspeople he has poisoned.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A poisoning plot thwarted by a gingerbread girl and a hedgehog should be delightfully weird, but Granjon plays it straight—theatrical without breaking the fourth wall, whimsical without any teeth. It's competent storybook animation that knows exactly what it is, which means it knows exactly what everyone else already made.
Granjon's command of theatrical space and character blocking within the animated frame sits comfortably in a lineage stretching from early stop-motion fables to contemporary Quebec animation—the formal clarity of the compositions and the precision of the comedic timing suggest a director fluent in how fantasy narratives structure themselves.
The decision to stage the entire carnival as a fully articulated theatrical set—rather than a naturalistic environment—is what makes the animation breathe; that formal constraint becomes the thing that lets every character movement and reaction register with clarity on a modest budget.