Garden Party Review

Garden Party is a 2017 French animated short film directed by Florian Babikian. It is a very interesting film.

Garden Party is the kind of animated short where not a lot of sophistication, message learning or deepness is involved. And while certainly it is languid in pacing and lacking in those areas, I still ended up really liking it as its story is just so original and wildly amusing. So it follows a bunch of frogs who explore a deserted rich house and try to find water and food. Eventually we witness the dead body of a gangster who owned the house.

This is a very interesting, authentic take on a gangster setup and I loved that twist at the end. I also liked the exploration of the house as it reminded me of all those Silly Symphonies of the early thirties, but the difference here is that the amphibians are never anthropomorphized and they remain very realistic which is very refreshing and ultimately sets the entire film apart from the rest. I loved its animation as it is the kind of computer animation that I like the best – very polished, modern and stunning, but also incredibly detailed and with exceptional, realistic design of the frogs.

Garden Party is simple, but it works thanks to an offbeat premise, a great ending and amazing, polished animation.