Little Otik
Dir. Jan Svankmajer
Little Otik is the troubling tale of a couple whose desperation for a baby pushes them to the brink of sanity. In an attempt to alleviate his wife Bozena’s distress, Karel offers her a tree root which she accepts as their child. Eventually however, they realise to their horror that the root has a voracious appetite that can’t be quelled by milk and carrot soup alone. Not since Eraserhead has parenthood seemed like such a nightmare.
Svankmajer is renowned for his ground-breaking and innovative use of stop-motion animation in his films. Many of his surreal short films comprise of his experiments in this medium. Svankmajer imbues his animated creations with so much life and character, more so in fact than those of his human/live action characters. Indeed Little Otik seems to highlight this trait of Svankmajer’s and even steps it up a notch. The human characters are drawn with the broadest of stokes, however the writhing mass of roots and twigs that make up the ‘child’ evokes empathy in the viewer.
To begin with, the fussy neighbours assume that Karel’s odd attitude is due to his anxiety about becoming a father. He is portrayed as an ineffectual man. Svankmajer seems to have stripped the human condition down to two things: feeding and breeding. When Karel presents Bozena with Otik, he seems to be offering her the hope of becoming a mother, something she wants desperately. Somehow, in Karel’s absence, Bozena gives life to the piece of twisted root and even suckles it. The scene where Karel returns to their cabin to witness this is eerily tranquil and disarming. His impotent burst of violence only pushes Bozena to compel him to face up to his responsibilities as a father. And it would seem that he eventually accepts this.
Initially it isn’t made clear whether or not Otik is actually alive, or if it is just a case of two desperate people allowing their imaginations to create a child for them. The opening scenes unfold as the brittle couple envision babies everywhere in their day to day lives. From the startling image of Karel carving open a melon to reveal a baby inside, to the more comical images of streets filled with women pushing prams in abundance. Svankmajer soon makes it clear that Otik is indeed alive and constantly craving sustenance. Monstrously so. It is Otik's parents that eventually become the monsters however. They eventually abandon little Otik in the cellar when things become too ‘difficult’ and too many people have started to go missing.
In the latter half of the film, events veer into overt horror as Otik begins to feed on living things, first of all a cat and then on people, starting with a postman and a social worker. Svenkmajer is strangely careful to represent Otik in a specific light. While a bloodthirsty monster, the creature is still a wayward infant in need of care, attention and guidance. There is a touching moment when the young girl from next door brings Otik some food and toys and washes his roots in a basin full of water before he eats, as he gurgles contentedly. She mutters to herself that his parents ‘deserve to be punished’ for the way they’ve treated him. As unsettling as his appearance is (all swarming roots, bundles of spindly twigs and branches with a hideously toothed mouth, wrapped in baby’s clothes), Svankmajer still shrouds him with a touch of humanity. He's an innocent acting purely on instinct.
Throughout, there's an unsettling fascination with food and images of eating and digestion. The process of eating is rendered a mindless, futile and ultimately distressingly greedy routine. No one in this film has their appetite sated, no matter what it is they crave, be it a family, a meal or an intimate caress. Waves of nausea emanate from every scene involving mealtimes as we are bombarded with close-ups of mouths chewing food and slurping down liquid.
A haunting piece of work, with startling imagery, pitch black humour and food for thought.
