The first time I saw a Czech animated film in a cinema, it was both familiar and unfamiliar. Decades have passed since the animated film "Strange Sock Spirit" from the European czech republic was released in China, evoking infinite memories. Outside of Hollywood, animated films in other countries have their own highlights, and "Strange Sock Genie" will bring a lot of surprises.
Compared with Hollywood animated films, the plot of Czech animated films is not the usual way, and the story setting and character setting are very novel, watching "Strange Sock Elf" is first of all to expand the audience's horizons and see unique European animated films.
Of course, watching a movie is not just about curiosity, a good story is the fundamental. Strange Sock Genie always wins in plot, and it's hard to think of the next second, which is amazing. Many Hollywood animated movies, or Japanese animated films, will inevitably have routines in the plot, the boundaries between good and evil are clear, the process is tortuous, but in the end it must be a bright ending, too conventional.
Strange Sock Genie is unconventional. The film tells that in the historical city of Prague, there is a group of sock elves, they eat socks for a living, their rules are very simple, steal human socks to eat, but only take one, this understand why there is always a sock in the family can not be found, right?
The protagonist of the film is named Xi Ligu, is a blue socks, the grandfather who is dependent on each other has just died, Xi Ligu went to the great uncle Godfather, this godfather is a nickname, is the name of the jianghu, the sock elves in this piece are afraid of him, the godfather is a domineering big man in stealing socks, not only has power, but also hoarded a room full of socks.
From the analysis of the story and human settings, the unusual thing about "Strange Sock Elves" is that this group of sock elves are thieves, specializing in stealing socks, which is a bit bad. This conflicts with the basically decent setting of the animated characters in the past, who specialize in stealing human socks and only stealing one, which is quite angry. But the image of this group of sock elves is really cute, and it is not too obvious to watch the stills, which is particularly cute in the animation. Very much in line with the consistent style of Czech animation, the image is unique, but the more you look at it, the more pleasing it is.
In terms of plot development, the protagonist Xiligu is a growing sock elf, in the bumpy fate of continuous learning to grow, this is very in line with the children's learning, although Xiligu also steals socks, but socks are the root of their lives, do not steal, but he began to learn to be friends with humans, in communication to learn to help each other, which may solve the problem of sock elf food chain.
"Strange Sock Elves" involves two major themes of growth and loneliness, the growth of Xiligu is a main line, and the loneliness of human beings is also a story line, and the film portrays a lonely old professor who is extremely bored, thinking about how to catch sock elves every day, and portraying the loneliness of the elderly living alone to the fullest. This movie is about a very common problem in the world today, the elderly live alone is very terrible, they long for someone to accompany, if there are really sock elves, they are good friends of the old people, but the elves do not exist, which requires young people to accompany the elderly, but it is difficult.
"Strange Sock Genie" is fun and thrilling, and has a good practical significance, which is very different from Hollywood animated films in all aspects, this movie once again opens a window for us in European animation, let us see what European animation looks like today, there are many countries in the world that are unique in animation films, we should not ignore.
Cui Ting/Wen