Félix Dufour-Laperrière’s Death Does Not Exist is not here with answers; it is a film, much like life, with more questions. In this beautifully hand-drawn animation film, we confront the anxieties of the contemporary world and question what it might mean to change it. It is a dilemma with no easy solutions, and the film explores it with an extraordinary poetic use of visual devices.
The film foreshadows the surrealism and symbolism that will be a motif throughout, with its first shot of beautifully drawn golden statues of wolves and sheep, of men and women in a wealthy home, the light shifting in their stone eyes. The film sets up the plot quite simply and with urgency. A group of activists is on the verge of fatally attacking a billionaire and his family as they discuss their plans and aspirations, their frustration with the increasingly unequal wealth and resource distribution in society, and the necessity of this violent act to set change in motion.
We meet our hesitant protagonist, Hélène. The group decides to move forward, guns in hand and revolution on their minds. The billionaire’s car pulls into the mansion, and they attack. In vivid, grotesque details, we see the exchange of bullets between the guards and the activists, the blood gushing out of their wounds, as the guards and revolutionaries fall one after another, the billionaire is shot to death as he tries to escape with his wife, who is in a wheelchair. We reveal Hélène, still behind the bushes, frozen with fear as her comrades fall. Her eyes meet the billionaire’s wife. Hélène watches the last of them go down. A guard turns to her, in a flash, she turns and runs back into the mountains.
The film hereon takes a metaphysical journey into Hélène’s psyche as she descends further into the jungle. It’s difficult to discern if Hélène is dreaming, dying, or escaping. The leader of the attack, Manon, haunts her, urging her to finish what she started, while a kid, possibly a younger version of herself, guides her further into the jungle. They become the physical manifestations of Hélène’s struggles to choose between collective action and self-preservation. The film is more contemporary to the current socio-political environment around the world than the live-action counterparts that were released through 2025. It intently maneuvers through a generation’s dilemma of growing up in an increasingly turbulent world.
It explores the themes of memory, loss, love, and man’s place in nature, all in relation to the exploitative systems of our society. With beautifully simple yet rich in detail, hand-drawn animation, the film plays with colours extensively to express changing themes. The characters take on the colors of their surrounding as they move through different landscapes. Ghosts of people loved and lost, animals of symbolic weight, flow in and out of the story as each scene gushes with meaning. At times, it can overwhelm an audience trying to keep up with the many topics the film explores, but one is nevertheless in awe of the finesse with which director Félix Dufour-Laperrière communicates with each frame.
It would be easy for a few to dismiss this film as bleak, but through its honest reflection, it actually becomes a radically hopeful piece of storytelling grounded in a truth larger than naive fascinations. Death Does Not Exist is a crucial piece of filmmaking in a post-truth world, as it argues its reality through a deeply felt experience.