What is the film about?

Sweet Like Lemons is a visual reflection on getting out of a harmful relationship and moving on – closing a chapter without first getting closure.

What influenced it?

Marc Chagall, Wassily Kandinsky

A little background information...

As a starting point, I was interest in the concept of closure after a very bad relationship. My own experience is that you really struggle to move on without the other person taking accountability over their actions. However, you can not control another person, and by feeling like you can’t move on without them acting the way you like you are essentially giving away your power – even after the relationship has ended. In Sweet Like Lemons, the message of the film is that you can decide to close the chapter by your own free will, without the permission of the other person.

The title is reference to this, as it both feels freeing and “sweet” to regain power over yourself, but also bitter (like lemons) to never get the accountability you longed for.

Because it felt important that the film would not be about the man or what he did, I chose to show the film from the woman’s point of view. The film largely takes place inside the woman’s emotions and memories, and we get glimpses of the relationship from her perspective. In her memories, she views herself as naive which is reflected in her character design, and the man transforms in nightmarish ways that reflect how he made her feel.

How was the film made?

Technically, it was first animated as outlines on TV paint. The frames were then printed out and painted by hand using acrylic paint. Then scanned in and reassembled digitally.

I worked without a script and storyboard. Instead I started by doing large scale, colourful paintings of what ended up being the final scene in the film. To me, these paintings symbolised joy and self empowerment. I then did a series of styleframes and short animated tests to figure out how the film would reach its conclusion. In the end I decided to use email-writing (of the woman trying to write a message to the man after breakup) as a narrative tool that also created a chapter divide. I had initially described the film as the letter you never intend to send, and it ended up working in literal (or visual) form in movie.

Credits:
Director, Producer, Animator, Scriptwriter – Jenny Jokela
Score – Sarah Playford
Sound Design – Adam Woodhams
Additional writing – Celia Hillo
Distribution – Vanja Andrijevic, Bonobostudio