The ugly Duckling of the aquatic world. The Quebec animated feature film Katak, the brave beluga is in a way the modern and local version of the famous tale of Hans Christian Andersen. Nicknamed “the little grey”, Katak, voiced by Alexandre Bacon (Fabulous), is a beluga who does not turn white due to stunted growth and who, despite his desire for adventures, must always stay close to the females of his clan, including his mother hen Marine (Guylaine Tremblay)… While his comrades and his neighbors the seals make fun of his physique and his color for the umpteenth time, he decides to join alone and in secret the great ice floe of the North. It is indeed there that his grandfather is, whom he wishes to bring back to the Saguenay Fjord to say goodbye to his tender Grandma, to whom Ginette Reno lends not only her voice, but also her wisdom.
Along the St. Lawrence, this not without danger odyssey produced by the duo of animators Christine Dallaire-Dupont (April and the rigged world) and Nicola Lemay (Felix and the treasure of Morgäa) dazzles as much by the beauty and detail of its decorations – remarkably marked by sublime sunsets, starry nights, banks of fog and other aurora borealis – as by its ecological purpose. Katak, the brave beluga is thus an astonishing environmental fable in which the young whale and its Saguenay congeners are fully aware of the risk of extinction of their population. As for the viewer, regardless of whether he is a child or an adult, he is subtly made aware of the various realities of underwater fauna and flora and climate issues. There are, for example, those few wandering and solitary cod who fear being devoured and completely disappearing; or even Estelle, Katak’s pregnant aunt, who loses her baby after being seriously disturbed by the passage of a ship, which the cetaceans of the protected area of the river call “floating”. The melting of the Arctic ice is also a fiercely discussed subject, thanks in particular to the unicorns of the sea, the narwhals, trapped by the fragmentation of the pack ice, and to this desperately hungry polar bear. In an intelligent, accessible and devoid of moralizing lessons, the film simply demonstrates that our waters are gradually becoming an environment hostile to life forms, often due to human activity.
Because, as Mamie says, her offspring is “a courageous young resourceful person who needs to assert herself”, Katak, the brave beluga finally looks like a very contemporary initiatory story: the attention paid to emotions and traumas occupies a prominent place, thanks to the always benevolent vision of its directors. And if The ugly Duckling teaches self-acceptance, the film by Christine Dallaire-Dupont and Nicola Lemay goes further by emphasizing the importance of empathy, diversity and unlikely friendships.