REVIEW OF LOVE, DEATH AND ROBOTS SEASON 3, EPISODE 9 - JIBARO

Jibaro is a seventeen-minute short animated film, directed by Alberto Mielgo. This animated film was awarded an Emmy for Outstanding Short Form Animated Program and Best Animated Series category.

The blurb reads – A deaf knight and a siren of myth become entwined in a deadly dance. A fatal attraction infused with blood, death and treasure. 

One of the most interesting things about this animation is the animation; it was flawless, the vibrant, the colours were beautiful and real, bringing life to the scenes. The emphasis in the animation placed on the main character's faces and colours, the vibrant leaves, or the coolness of the water. Very little emphasis was placed on the character’s faces. The siren's and Jibaro's faces were the only faces that were shown in detail. 

The communication strategies used in the film make it one of the most disputed short stories to date. The film relies on sound to tell its story, which is interesting as the titular character, Jibaro is deaf and the siren uses sound as her weapon. The different types of sound present in this movie tell a tell of their own. From the muffled sounds of the landscape to the siren’s song to Jibaro yelling in fear when he can finally hear, his excited exclamations when he can finally hear. The siren’s screams. Her pain, confusion, anger and humiliation. All of these are expressed in the simplest ways: facial expressions and sounds.

Another way the short film attempted to communicate with the audience was with facial expressions and gestures. Through them, we see a wide range of emotions, greed, lust wonder, fear, anger, and heartbreak. The siren herself never spoke. Only through dance and sultry gestures did she attract others to her. This was an interesting respite from sirens lazing around on rocks. There are so many visual cues in the film. Such that watching it again and again, you get a new perspective to the story. This is perhaps one of my favourite visual experiences.

 

Character

The story revolves around two main characters, Jibaro, a soldier, and a siren. We can see that they are both predators, powerful creatures who are used to getting what they want. The first emotion we see in Jibaro quite clearly is greed. While his mates are meeting with the Church, he finds what appears to be a small gold coin. He attempts to hide the coin from the rest. Looking behind furtively to see if anyone realized what he found.

We see more of this greed when the siren comes to see him at night and Jibaro tries to grab her. She pulls away, leaving him with a ruby embedded in his palm. He also see the ruthlessness that comes with that greed after he callously throws her body over the waterfall, after ripping the jewelry and yanking it away from her.

Theme

The themes of this story revolve around, greed, toxic relationships. The main characters are predators in their own right. Jibaro’s fascination with the siren, her fascination with him. In a scene at the waterfall, she kisses him. Her jewelled lips and tongue tear into Jibaro, making him bleed. She does not seem to be aware of this or to even care. In the same way Jibaro does not care that stripping her of her adornment makes her bleed and is likely to cause her death.

They ended up destroying one another. The siren kills Jibaro and he drowns. She no longer has any of her ornamentations in the end. She wakes up in pain, humiliated and betrayed.