Jérémy Clapin

Jérémy Clapin, born smack in the middle of Paris in ’74, is the kind of filmmaker who doesn’t just tell stories—he sort of sneaks them into your mind and lets them haunt you for days. The guy behind “J’ai Perdu Mon Corps” (yeah, that’s “I Lost My Body” if you’re watching it outside France), Clapin’s work doesn’t mess around with the usual animation tropes. Nope, his movies have this weird, poetic darkness that creeps up on you. “Skhizein” is another one—short film, wild premise, all about a dude who gets struck by a meteorite and then finds himself living exactly 91 centimeters away from his own body. Trippy, right? And then there’s “Meanwhile on Earth,” his latest, which is set to drop in 2024. People are already buzzing, because let’s be real, Clapin doesn’t do “normal.” He’s got this knack for digging into the messy, fragile parts of being human. In “J’ai Perdu Mon Corps,” it’s literally about a severed hand crawling through Paris, desperate to reconnect with its owner. But it’s really about loneliness, memory, and, weirdly, hope. Clapin’s visual style is unmistakable—moody, raw, sometimes downright uncomfortable—and he’s not afraid to let silence do the heavy lifting. You won’t find a lot of easy answers in his movies, just a lot of “wait, what did I just watch?” moments. Basically, if you’re into animation that isn’t afraid to get a little weird (and a lot emotional), Clapin’s your guy.