Much like how Le Portrait de Petit Cossette begged for my attention, so did its titular character call out to Eiri, the show's protagonist. He manages his uncle's antiques shop, which is constantly flooded with new objects. Among these objects is a Venetian glass cup. The glass belonged to Cossette, who lived during the 18th century and was murdered by the artist Marcello; his love for Cossette transformed into a perverse fixation with preventing her from aging, and by extension, from changing her appearance in his artwork.
A portrait of Cossette.
Cossette appears before Eiri whenever he looks at the glass. He falls in love with this phantasm, who plans on making him the reincarnation of Marcello so that through Eiri, Marcello can atone for his sins. Of course, Eiri does not agree with this and tries to show Cossette that he loves her and is not the same person as the misguided Marcello. Initially the story is hard to comprehend and doesn't offer details as to why Eiri was burdened with Marcello's punishment; Cossette says that Eiri is artistic like Marcello was, which seems a weak arbitrary decision at best. If Eiri had been a descendant of the artist or something, his curse would have made more sense. Such a scenario might have been cliche of course; at the end of the day anyone might have been suitable as Marcello's vessel.
The show's strengths lie not in its narrative, but in its aesthetics and stylistic references. Numerous artworks and films came to mind as I watched Petit Cossette, as if my Cinema Studies and Art History classes were jumbled together into three forty-minute episodes. Cossette herself can be associated with a larger Japanese theme of “haunting women spirits.” The yuki-onna (snow woman) is a popular example from Japanese folklore, written of in the book, Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, and later depicted in the film, Kwaidan (1964). More directly related to Petit Cossette is the myth of the onryō or vengeful spirit, which found modern day depictions in films such as Ring (1998) and Ju-on: The Grudge (2003); both were adapted into American films soon after. Punishment and atonement in such stories is abstracted into fatalistic issues not directly related to the protagonist/victim who must pay such a price. The same can be said of Eiri, who begins to fall in love with Cossette without realizing that she needs him in order to relieve her own spirit of its agony. He didn't directly cause Cossette any pain, but was arbitrarily chosen to suffer in Marcello's stead.
Eiri in suffering.
The events of Le Portrait de Petit Cossette often take place in abstract, surreal dreamscapes. Eiri is transported to these lands as he interacts with Cossette, and we are never told if these locations are either imagined or in another dimension; at one point Cossette takes Eiri to a land where the living and the dead can interact, an absurd Inception-like world where anything can be constructed at will. Twisted landscapes are reminiscent of old German Expressionist films; The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), a film I watched during my freshman year, similarly featured labrythine landscape and tilted buildings and trees. Interestingly enough, the end of that film reveals that what took place was a fantasy conjured by an asylum inmate, who imagined he was investigating a murder mystery. Also, the artwork of surrealist painters like Max Ernst and Salvador Dali vaguely comes to mind (for my fellow Art History students out there). Petit Cossette takes advantage of the almost border-less realm of animation and paints an unforgettable universe. The only time the scenery is lacking polish is in the third and final OVA episode, when an odd 3D computer generated tower is introduced into Eiri and Cossette's private world.
Somewhere...
Le Portrait de Petit Cossette is brief, which may be a good thing. I walked away from this show with a slight headache as I tried to comprehend what I just saw. If the theme of this analysis is, "Elijah Lee recalls Cinema Studies classes," then one aspect of those classes I do not miss is the overwhelming confusion I suffered in the name of intellectualism. Petit Cossette does a good job of avoiding the pretentious mess that can easily occur in film projects with very few creative restrictions; the anime Ergo Proxy pushed itself a little too far in that regard. The fact that Petit Cossette falls within the psychological horror genre also allows it to be a little outlandish. This was a unique experience for me.
- Elijah Lee
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