OSCARS 2026: Little Amélie or the Character of Rain (2025)

The world of animation can be a delightful, unexpected place once you step outside the shallow frame work of big budget American stuff. Internationally, an animated feature can capture all sorts of tones and stories. Unless you are especially plugged into the world of French cartooning, "Little Amélie or the Character of Rain" was probably not on your radar at the start of last year. It is an independent production from Maïlys Vallade, the director of short "The Lighthouse Keeper," and Liane-Cho Han, a storyboard artist and animator who has worked on "The Illusionist" and "The Little Prince." Not big names, in other words. After getting picked up domestically by GKIDS, who have really established themselves as the face of quirky overseas animation in this country, the previously overlooked film suddenly became a serious contender for a Best Animated Feature Oscar. Maybe not quite the insane, out-of-nowhere success story of last year's "Flow" but pretty dang cool anyway. 

An intelligent consciousness emerges out of the universe and claims to be God. It incarnates in the body of Amélie, an infant recently born to a Belgian family living in 1960s Japan. After "thousands of years" of silently observing the world from within an invisible bubble, Amélie begins to cry and interact with her parents and siblings. Frustrated with being treated like a baby, it's only after her grandmother gives her a white chocolate bar that Amélie reveals her unusual intelligence to her family. Now talking eloquently and running around, she begins to learn a lot about the world. That her older brother is a brat, that rain is fabulous but water can be dangerous, that a carp is an ugly fish. That people do not live forever. In particular, she bonds with Nishio-san, the family's live-in Japanese housekeeper. As their friendship grows closer, Amélie and Nishio are tested by the boundaries of physical space and Kashima-san, the landowner who still holds onto resentment of outsiders from the war.

The central metaphor of "Little Amélie" is both highly amusing and grounded. When a child is first born and has no understanding of other people or the outside world, they truly do believe themselves to be the center of the universe. When Amélie describes herself as God, it's an unavoidable expression of a mind that is new to existing. Despite her claimed omniscience and immortality, she doesn't understand concepts like death, national boundaries, or the division between reality and fantasy. She is, in other words, a baby: Utterly self-centered but completely new to the world existing around her. The contrast between what Amélie thinks about herself and what she sees with how she actually acts provides both humor and pathos. "The Character of Rain" is a story about her learning about life, like a hundred coming-of-age stories before it. By assuming the perspective of this unusually precocious child, the film approaches its premise of a newborn realizing she isn't the most important thing in the world but that she matters nevertheless in a fresh, funny, interesting way. 

Maybe I'm giving the French too much credit but, if an American had made "Little Amélie," you can imagine its premise being played in a more grounded way. Amélie would think herself a God but she would still be a newborn, with all the physical and mental limitations that come with that. Europeans have more whimsy in their heart than that. This means Amélie is both just a child and also possessed of a cosmic intelligence. She stands up and addresses all her family members by name, something that both surprises them and doesn't seem worthy of further comment. The child has surreal visions of the world, the effects of which on those around her seem to vary from scene to scene. The film happily operates with a degree of magical realism, existing in more-or-less the real world but with unpredictable interventions of fantasy. 

The film is based on a partially autobiographical novel by a French-speaking Belgian woman who grew up in Asia. Personal details on co-director Liane-Cho Han are scarce but we know he lived and worked in France, currently resides in Denmark, and has a Chinese name. The cross-cultural elements of this story are very personal to its creators, clearly. Nishio teaches Amélie about Japanese folklore, about the meaning of her name in the local language, and the Obon ritual of floating a lantern down a river to honor the dead. When the child is told that her family isn't actually Japanese, and will return to Belgium some day, it confuses and frustrates her. Kashima-san, meanwhile, is stern towards the immigrants, still haunted by memories of World War II. She certainly doesn't consider Amélie Japanese. This is resolved in a quiet, touching way later on but it points towards a more interesting idea. Cultural identities are not set by borders. We are more the results of the people we know and the world around us than our nationality or race, boundaries that can easily be crossed by love and understanding. 

“Little Amélie” also shows a clear multi-cultural element in its animation. Studio Ghibli and Rémi Chayéhas have both been mentioned as influences, both of which are evident. The characters often have the big, expressive eyes of anime characters which are combined with the rich colors and painterly appearances of various European studios. Regardless of who inspired what, “The Character of Water” is gorgeous. The surreal flights of fantasy feature Amélie turning into a downpour of water, parting the sea, or the faces of her and her brother intermingling with cods breaking the surface of the water. Considering the important role rain and water play in the story, the film seeks similarly fluid and free-moving visuals. The blending of expressionistic colors and beautifully smooth movements makes the film a sight to behold, almost overwhelming in its loveliness at times. 

I'm glad international animation like this gets the Academy's spotlight. It would be nice if films like these won Oscars more often too. Still, Vallade and Han are surely comforted by the fact that they made a wonderful film. “Little Amélie or the Character of Rain” is amazing to look at, funny, insightful, and fascinating. [9/10]