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Modern Films has sent over the UK trailer and artwork for the award-winning stop-motion animated feature MEMOIR OF A SNAIL, which opens at UK and Irish cinemas on 14 February 2025, plus details of five advance preview screenings including a Q&A with writer/director Adam Elliot.

Winner of the Best Film ‘Cristal’ Award at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival and the Best Film Prize at this year’s BFI London Film Festival (the first time an animated feature has ever taken the top prize), nominated for a Golden Globe, short-listed for Animated Feature of The Year at the London Critics’ Circle Film Awards and long-listed for the 2025 BAFTA Film Awards, Memoir of a Snail is the bittersweet tale of a lonely woman, Grace Pudel, who retells her life story to a humble garden snail called Sylvia. 

Featuring the voice talents of Sarah Snook (Succession) as Grace with Kodi Smit-McPhee as her estranged twin brother Gilbert, this is another incredibly rich and moving feature-length “clayography” from one of the world's most admired animation auteurs - part seven of Elliot’s Trilogy of Trilogies (three short shorts, three long shorts, three features). The voice cast also includes Eric Bana, Nick Cave, Dominique Pinon and Jacki Weaver and like Adam's previous adult works, the film is based on his family and friends and explores challenging subject matter that is often dark but tempered with moments of hilarity and warmth.

Grace Pudel is a lonely misfit with an affinity for collecting ornamental snails and an intense love for books. At a young age, when Grace is separated from her fire-breathing twin brother Gilbert, she falls into a spiral of anxiety and angst. Despite a continued series of hardships, inspiration and hope emerge when she strikes up an enduring friendship with an elderly eccentric woman named Pinky, who is full of grit and lust for life.

Coming 15 years since Elliot’s last feature Mary & Max, Memoir of a Snail was created using traditional stopmotion animation techniques, with every single prop, set, and character (over 7,000 in total) a handmade unique and tangible object. Hundreds of arms, eyeballs and mouths were handcrafted and then brought to life one frame at a time.

The poignant, heartfelt, hilarious chronicle of the life of an outsider finding her confidence and silver linings amongst the clutter of everyday life, Memoir of a Snail opens in cinemas in the UK and Ireland on 14 February 2025.
Transcript
00:00Dad used to say that childhood was like being drunk. Everyone remembers what you did, except
00:12you.
00:13My twin brother, Gilbert, we had two souls, but one heart.
00:22Look, Gracie.
00:23Rabbit face, rabbit face, rabbit face.
00:30Why are you dressed like an ant?
00:37No, I'm a snail.
00:42Oh.
00:43Funny.
00:45I believed in glasses half full and silver linings.
00:52Life was fleeting, but so precious.
00:58Oh, bravo.
01:00Oh, now she's got a boyfriend.
01:08Life can only be understood backwards, but we have to live it forwards.
01:17Say cheese, Gracie.
01:19Snails never go back over their trail.
01:22As soon as I'm old enough and got money, I'm coming to get you.
01:27Childhood was life's best season. It never lasts, but everyone deserves one.
01:37I remember everything.