By Jonah Naplan

July 8, 2022

I’ve never seen a character quite like Marcel in a movie before. Marcel (Jenny Slate) is a one-inch tall YouTube sensation, who’s also a passionate Lesley Stahl idolizer. He watches “60 Minutes” regularly, so much so, that he has started only calling it “The Show.” Marcel lives in an Airbnb alongside his humble community, consisting of more shells, and other miscellaneous objects from around the house, including his pet lint named Alan. Our young protagonist’s community is tight-knit, but Marcel is the closest with his grandmother, Connie (Isabella Rossellini). Marcel and his community have built a thriving civilization inside of this house. But they mostly live in secret. Guests come and go, but they’ve never noticed the tiny creatures that scurry about the house. That is, until Dean, (Dean Fleischer-Camp playing himself) a filmmaker who decides to make a documentary on this young shell, enters the picture.

This is a delightful little movie. And it’s a film that doesn’t have a specific target audience. Rather, it aims for the broadest appeal possible. It may go for deep messaging at times, but even so, it’s the type of movie that both kids and parents can enjoy. It’s an intelligent family feature. Marcel is so adorable, but surprisingly wise. His monologues contain not just social commentary, but also valuable insight into everyday life. The only thing Marcel knows is his livelihood in the confinement of the Airbnb. He has tunnels running throughout the house, a garden that he helps Connie maintain, and even a “breadroom.” (It’s a bedroom, but the beds are made of bread.) In one humbling scene, we see, from the view of a video camera, Marcel riding on the dashboard of Dean’s car. Dean takes Marcel into the city, and shows him a gorgeous view from atop a large hill. There are houses, buildings, and cars driving on the street below. Marcel asks if this is all there is to the outside world, but Dean says no. This is only one part of one major city. There are many more major cities beyond their sight.

Dean begins recording short videos of Marcel describing his life in this small world he’s become accustomed to, and then posts them to YouTube. Marcel starts out small, but pretty quickly becomes a success. People are doing impressions of Marcel, responding to his videos, and even tattooing him on their various body parts. Dean sees this as a wonderful opportunity for Marcel to seek help via livestream, asking people to seek out his previous family who he so desires to reunite with again. Before the house became an Airbnb, it belonged to a couple, Mark (Thomas Mann) and Larissa (Rosa Salazar), who got divorced about two years before this movie takes place. Marcel misses them and hopes they’re okay. He doesn’t necessarily understand the struggles that humans face, and thinks that everything can just be resolved in an instant. He may be wrong and naive, but that’s actually what makes his character so likable and endearing. It’s probably the same reason why the YouTube fanbase liked him too.

Eventually, Lesley Stahl herself, and the producers of “60 Minutes” get roped into Marcel’s endearment, and email Dean, asking if they’d be interested in filming an episode all about the two of them. Of course, Marcel is ecstatic, but Dean is a little more unsure. Either way, the crew ends up filming the episode, and later, when we as the audience get to view it, the footage is actually quite fascinating.

As Marcel begins to grow a newfound understanding of the way the world works, we too begin to change as audience members. This is a very transporting movie. It’s very easy to suspend our disbelief in these characters, and dismiss basic points of logic. Sure, we don’t know how Marcel breathes, considering he’s a hollow shell, or how he’s able to spring to life in the first place, but the film manages to be profound to a point that we don’t really care about those technical specificities. It’s rare that a film can ask so many deep questions about our very existence without seeming pretentious or over-cooked. Even more impressive is that a movie about a shell wearing a pair of sneakers is the one to do so.

Jenny Slate, the voice and creator of the persona that is Marcel, thought of the idea for the character on a whim. She was apparently just bored at a wedding in 2010. It’s actually pretty cool to think about how her character has evolved in the twelve years since then. Dean Fleischer Camp is Slate’s ex-husband, but he was heavily involved in the inception of the character, and is essentially the brains powering this entire movie’s backbone. His relationship with Marcel is so charming, but he’s almost always behind the camera. It’s not until we actually see the two of them together in frame that we feel truly touched. Their evolving friendship is so decent, so unique, and so humbling. Just like this movie.