This movie is a moment of introspection, very intimate, staged through a succession of small moments imbued with poetry, absurdity and sometimes surrealism…

Our world is hurting, and so is the human race. ‘À la fin’ is a two and a half minute short about a moment of introspection. Incredibly intimate, Nicholas Lichtle created a uniquely styled and pensive film. Staged through a succession of small moments imbued with poetry, absurdity and surrealism. ‘À la fin’ is not a commissioned work, it’s neither fiction nor animation, the graphic style is self-proclaimed rather singular. But it goes much deeper than most two hour movies do.

à la fin / in the end

I started this film a year ago, with the initial idea of working on a succession of moments, small autonomous scenes with no relation to each other… I noticed very quickly that they reflected my anxieties and my questions about today’s world…

A globalized world, in search of speed, performance and infinite growth.

A world subject to climate disruptions (which are becoming more and more numerous), depressions linked to social networks and to all these screens that constantly solicite us, a world that isolates us from one another more and more each day. This feeling of isolation and loneliness has been exacerbated by the health crisis linked to COVID 19.

So I found a kind of outlet in this film to respond to my anxieties.

Each scene offers several points of entry and can be interpreted in several ways so that each person can find a meaning, an interpretation or a questioning of his own.

I chose to combine several techniques, in a rather strange and unorthodox way, I used greenscreen stock shots that I diverted according to my ideas and moods of the moment … I reworked each film with a classic frame by frame animation technique (to get closer to the stop motion aesthetics).

By its simplicity, every image becomes more profound. By removing all the distractions from the narrative, Nicholas created a timeless piece that anyone can relate to. A fine mix between beautiful and disturbing images played within a soothing tone. Which in sum leaves us with lots to ponder about after watching.