‘Marcel the Shell with Shoes On’: Jenny Slate Leads New Family Classic (Review)

Five minutes into Marcel the Shell with Shoes On, the only thing that will matter to you in the whole world is the life of the titular shell. The feature-length expansion of Dean Fleisher Camp and Jenny Slate‘s hilarious YouTube videos about an anthropomorphic shell is a surprisingly profound and moving piece of art. It wears its simplicity on its shell, embracing clear themes that establish the tiny Marcel and his grandmother Connie as two of the most surprisingly relatable characters in movies this year.

You don’t have to be familiar with the YouTube shorts to get into Marcel the Shell, which expands far beyond what those three-minute films presented. Camp (playing a fictionalized version of himself) moves into an Airbnb after his marriage ends and finds Marcel (Slate) and his grandmother, Nanna Connie (Isabella Rossellini!), living there. Since he is a filmmaker, Camp decides to make a documentary about Marcel and Connie’s daily life until he learns Marcel once had an entire family. Marcel lost contact with them when the house’s previous tenets broke up and one unknowingly took them.

Meanwhile, Camp has been uploading clips from his film on YouTube and they are slowly getting more attention. Marcel begins to wonder if his status as a YouTube star can help him find his family, and Camp reluctantly agrees to help. This is where Slate, Camp, and their collaborators Nick Paley and producer Elisabeth Holm make one of their most biting commentaries on social media culture. Yes, Marcel’s videos get attention and thousands of comments, but nothing that’s helpful. Instead, people are more interested in taking performative actions like showing up at Marcel’s house to show support and get more likes without actually doing anything for his search.

Marcel the Shell should remind audiences of those classic Pixar movies that found ways to evoke a deep concern and love for the inanimate objects speaking to us from the screen. Marcel’s love for his family is something many of us can connect with. If we’re sitting in that dark theater alone, there’s an instant yearning to be with our families after it’s over. But it’s also his deep love for Connie that is heartbreaking. At a time when so many aren’t paying attention to their elders, it seems so bizarre that the best recent portrait we have of a younger person caring deeply about what happens to a grandparent on screen comes from a story about shells. Marcel desperately wants to find his family, but not at the expense of the one family member he still has.

The film is also wonderfully animated and the voice performances bring Marcel and Connie to life. It remains astounding that Slate and Camp cast Isabella Rossellini as Connie. The living legend’s kind, warm voice is perfect for the part. Camp’s funny and genuine interactions with Marcel also go far in selling the gist of the movie. If we can’t be convinced that the one human buys that Marcel and Connie are real, there’s no way for the audience to do the same.

Marcel the Shell is a perfect movie for this moment. It critiques our social media-obsessed world while providing a story that lodges an arrow straight in your heart. The movie has a shot at becoming a real family classic if you can find it within yourself to believe a shell can wear shoes and shed a tear.