‘Chicken for Linda!’ Review: A Touching Coming-of-Age Cartoon Caper Made With the Finest Ingredients
A throwback, of sorts, to the kinds of animated kids flicks that existed before the advent of Pixar and CGI, Chicken for Linda! (Linda veut du poulet !) is a lovingly hand-drawn ode to the whims and wills of capricious children: specifically, one very stubborn little French girl who won’t take no for an answer when it comes to her favorite meal.
This new collaboration from directors Chiara Malta (Simple Women) and Sébastien Laudenbach (The Girl Without Hands) is a simple and even silly story on the surface, following an action-packed day in the life of its titular heroine as she tries to get her mom to cook a family poultry recipe for dinner. But as the plot — or is that the sauce? — thickens, the film begins to probe deeper, exploring how kids and adults can be affected by the death of a loved one, and how they can eventually try to move on.
This new collaboration from directors Chiara Malta (Simple Women) and Sébastien Laudenbach (The Girl Without Hands) is a simple and even silly story on the surface, following an action-packed day in the life of its titular heroine as she tries to get her mom to cook a family poultry recipe for dinner. But as the plot — or is that the sauce? — thickens, the film begins to probe deeper, exploring how kids and adults can be affected by the death of a loved one, and how they can eventually try to move on.
- 4/10/2024
- by Jordan Mintzer
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
GKids is definitely back: After winning its first Oscar for Hayao Miyazaki’s “The Boy and the Heron,” the prestigious indie distributor has another animated contender this season with “Chicken for Linda.” The delightful hand-painted French-Italian musical comedy took the 2023 Annecy Cristal Award and the Animation Is Film Grand Jury Prize.
Directed by the married duo Chiara Malta (the live-action “Simple Women”) and Sébastien Laudenbach (the animated “The Girl Without Hands”), the film is about memory and mother-daughter bonding. After Paulette (voiced by Clotilde Hesme) wrongly punishes 8-year-old Linda (Melinée Leclerc), she tries to make it up to her by cooking her late husband’s signature dish: chicken and peppers. It’s the only memory Linda has of her father, who returns as narrator to help fill the void through magical realism. What ensues is a wild chase to catch a chicken during a supermarket strike.
The project grew out...
Directed by the married duo Chiara Malta (the live-action “Simple Women”) and Sébastien Laudenbach (the animated “The Girl Without Hands”), the film is about memory and mother-daughter bonding. After Paulette (voiced by Clotilde Hesme) wrongly punishes 8-year-old Linda (Melinée Leclerc), she tries to make it up to her by cooking her late husband’s signature dish: chicken and peppers. It’s the only memory Linda has of her father, who returns as narrator to help fill the void through magical realism. What ensues is a wild chase to catch a chicken during a supermarket strike.
The project grew out...
- 4/10/2024
- by Bill Desowitz
- Indiewire
Animation has the power to make even the simplest emotions feel as infinite and expressive as our most sacred memories, which — despite the edifying nuance and eye-popping flair of recent films such as “Encanto” and “Across the Spider-Verse” — can make it frustrating that American studios have largely been trending toward overcomplicated plots and realistic design. Sébastien Laudenbach and Chiara Malta’s extremely French “Chicken for Linda” is the clearest possible reminder of what we’ve been missing. It’s about an eight-year-old girl named Linda who wants to eat chicken for dinner. Delightful mayhem ensues.
As in Laudenbach’s “The Girl Without Hands,” all of the characters are traced with thick black lines that lend them the aspirational possibility of a fashion sketch; each of them is filled in with a single swash of color that spills over the charcoal borders of their body whenever they get excited. Linda (voiced by Melinée Leclerc) is yellow,...
As in Laudenbach’s “The Girl Without Hands,” all of the characters are traced with thick black lines that lend them the aspirational possibility of a fashion sketch; each of them is filled in with a single swash of color that spills over the charcoal borders of their body whenever they get excited. Linda (voiced by Melinée Leclerc) is yellow,...
- 4/2/2024
- by David Ehrlich
- Indiewire
In Chiara Malta and Sébastien Laudenbach’s Chicken for Linda!, Paulette (Clotilde Hesme) feels guilty about punishing her eight-year-old daughter, Linda (Mélinée Leclerc), for something she didn’t do. To make things up to Linda, Paulette agrees to prepare the dish that was her late husband’s specialty: chicken with peppers. The day of the dinner, though, coincides with a widespread strike, closing all the grocery stores across town and forcing Paulette, with Linda in tow, to improvise. What follows is a charming, madcap race to the dinner table that manages to rope in bumbling cops, a determined older sister, and live poultry.
Chicken for Linda! is beautifully animated in a style that has its roots in the hand-painted aesthetic of Laudenbach’s 2016 film The Girl Without Hands, though it feels completely distinctive. The characters are given cartoonish features through prominent black lines and single colors to distinguish them; Linda...
Chicken for Linda! is beautifully animated in a style that has its roots in the hand-painted aesthetic of Laudenbach’s 2016 film The Girl Without Hands, though it feels completely distinctive. The characters are given cartoonish features through prominent black lines and single colors to distinguish them; Linda...
- 3/31/2024
- by Steven Scaife
- Slant Magazine
"You're chickening out, aren't you?" GKids has revealed the full US trailer for a French animated film titled Chicken for Linda!, set for a US release in theaters in April. This hand-painted animation first premiered in the Acid sidebar at the 2023 Cannes Film Festival last year, with stops at the Annecy, Thessaloniki, and Torino Film Festivals last year as well. A loving mom, Paulette, who feels guilty after unfairly punishing her daughter Linda and would do anything to make it up to her. She sets off to make a "chicken with peppers", even though she doesn't know how to cook. The two talented directors on this film "unleash a unique visual marvel of hand-painted animation with bright, color-blocked characters, and a story that is an intoxicating blend of slapstick comedy, musical, and family drama, as Paulette and Nina ultimately confront the grief of an unspoken tragedy, and the meal that...
- 2/29/2024
- by Alex Billington
- firstshowing.net
Lately, in the overwrought majority of Hollywood blockbusters, nothing less than the fate of the planet hangs in the balance, as some natural disaster or dastardly supervillain threatens to annihilate life as we know it. Such impossibly large stakes may be necessary to justify the CG spectacle of certain Marvel movies, but instead of inspiring excitement, they mostly leave me ambivalent and bored. But focus in on something as simple as whether a young girl can have the chicken dish that reminds her of her late dad, and I’m riveted. Bonus points if said cartoon feels more realistic than most live-action fare.
A uniquely styled and all-around delightful hand-drawn family drama, “Chicken for Linda!” premiered at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, programmed practically out of sight in the Acid, a sidebar dedicated to low-budget independent productions that’s easily overlooked (despite having launched the career of “Anatomy of a Fall...
A uniquely styled and all-around delightful hand-drawn family drama, “Chicken for Linda!” premiered at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, programmed practically out of sight in the Acid, a sidebar dedicated to low-budget independent productions that’s easily overlooked (despite having launched the career of “Anatomy of a Fall...
- 8/3/2023
- by Peter Debruge
- Variety Film + TV
Chicken For Linda! is a joyful animated family tale that sees a little girl (voiced by Mélinée Leclerc) embark on a farcical musical adventure with her mum Paulette (voiced by Clotilde Hesme) after a mistaken accusation leads Paulette trying to make good on her promise of a special chicken dish for tea. The quest is complicated by a general strike, the shenanigans of the bird in question and the emotional territory Linda and Paulette are navigating after the death of Linda’s dad.
The film - which just took home the top prize at Annecy Film Festival, along with a Gan Foundation award for distribution - has a vibrant palette that represents its characters in single colours and employs a style that, rather than be photorealistic, emphasises the movements of the characters, particularly the children.
The colour...
The film - which just took home the top prize at Annecy Film Festival, along with a Gan Foundation award for distribution - has a vibrant palette that represents its characters in single colours and employs a style that, rather than be photorealistic, emphasises the movements of the characters, particularly the children.
The colour...
- 6/21/2023
- by Amber Wilkinson
- eyeforfilm.co.uk
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