Current review: The Most Precious of Cargoes (2024)

Alive with ambience.

This is a French animated film set in World War 2. The general plot is simple enough – woodcutter wife rescues a baby thrown from a train that is carrying Jewish people on their way to a concentration camp. The woodcutter himself does not want this baby - they are poor enough already. But the wife is determined.

 My favourite thing about this film is how immersive it is – the visuals, the sound. I was right there with the characters, which, in the first scene, was right there in a winter forest, trudging through snow, barely able to see in front of me. I could practically feel the resistance of the crunchy snow. The design of the characters was so simple – thickly drawn lines with facial expressions that barely moved – yet so effective. Which brings me to the other thing I liked about the film - the slow burn loveability of the woodcutter. We watch him for a long time as what seems like a two dimensional grump of a man; so the eventual softening to the baby hits just the right emotional note. But it’s not just a baby in front of a man – it’s a Jewish baby in a Jewish-hating region. The woodcutter hears his wife’s words, “the heartless have a heart” (where heartless refers to a slur against the Jewish people) and he makes this phrase his mantra and will do anything to defend its meaning.

This film doesn’t shy away from the horror of the holocaust at all. The most impactful scene is a when a Jewish man, finally free from the camp, faces his reflection for the first time - a ghastly, skeletal image; the music crescendos as he realizes what everyone else sees – an almost inhuman figure, created by the inhumanity done to him.

It’s an emotional and hopeful film, with very pleasing visuals.