Marona

A dog looks back at the ups and downs of an adventurous life in Anca Damian’s delightful, witty, and ultimately moving animated tale. As our heroine, Marona, tells us her story, Damian uses an amazingly diverse series of animation techniques—from cut outs to 2D and 3D forms—to bring this dog’s life to the screen with a high-spirited energy that manages to delineate character and convey emotion in equal portions. Although it never sinks into sentimentality, be prepared to shed a tear or two…

‘“Everyone had the right to love and a bone.” That’s just one of the many canine insights served up by Marona’s Fantastic Tale [the English-language title], a dazzling expressionistic view of the world through the eyes of a stray dog… Eye-tickling in its design, occasionally tear-jerking in its execution, Marona feels vibrant and upbeat even in moments of melancholy—like diving into an artistic child’s sketchbook and watching the illustrations splash to life all around.’—Peter Debruge, Variety