$9.99

2008 stop-animated feature

Rating: 13/20

Plot: A bunch of clay people living in an apartment building in Sydney contemplate their lives.

I suppose I wanted to like this more than I actually did. The characters and their experiences scratch the surface of philosophical ideas but refuse to penetrate, and I demand penetration in my animated movies. Speaking of penetration, there is a clay figure sex scene and some nudity if that's your bag. Who we kidding? We both know it is! This flashes from character to character pretty rapidly, too quickly for me to really connect with or care about what's going on with any of them. The animation's really good although the characters are at times so unattractive that they don't even look human. They also move funny. But there are some nifty effects with bottlecaps, water, and other movements that make this visually interesting. Some quirky imaginative moments including the angel on the cover and some very tiny people as well as a couple surprises at the end make this narratively interesting as well, but it's not really enough to make me completely thrilled that I spent about ninety minutes with these characters. The philosophical jabs failed to knock me out.