Change and Continuity in Contemporary Children’s Cinema

Abstract

In the context of the continued evolution of children’s film into and through the early twenty-first century, this chapter examines a boundary-pushing example of contemporary children’s film, the recent French-Swiss animation, My Life as a Courgette (Ma vie de courgette, Claude Barras 2016). Widely interpreted by critics as a radical departure from classical children’s film (and even, in some quarters, as an adult-orientated film), My Life as a Courgette challenges many of the narrative and representational motifs of the children’s genre. However, drawing parallels with other twenty-first-century international children’s films, this chapter highlights the ways in which the film adheres to more traditional features of children’s cinema that date back to the early twentieth century.