Summary
Elfkins is a delightful German animation that can have something for the whole family to enjoy with its charming message.
Elfkins, or in the native German Heinzelmannchen of Cologne, were gnomes who secretly helped craftsman for generations, until they got exposed and go into hiding for years. Two centuries after they last helped a craftsman, they live underground with each member of the society having a skill; Kipp being the one that can create anything, while Helvi always has bright ideas, but she is very accident-prone, which will have her wanting to search for a human to learn from, against the will of the elders of the society. On the surface, Helvi is joined by Butz and Kipp, where the three find themselves in a bakery run by Theo, who has seen his business start to crumble, with his own brother looking to close him down. Helvi decides she wants to learn how to bake, which will see her bring the passion back into Theo’s life as he goes into one more battle to keep his bakery.
Elfkins is a film that will look to capitalize on the family market, by showing us a world where humans can work with fantasy creatures of folklore to make the world tick around more. We have seen plenty of different legends of fantasy creatures that have helped people in life and this is no different, it will give people hope that they could achieve something from hard work. We get a couple of strong musical numbers that flow with the animation that we are seeing, usually used through the creation and with the ideas for different cakes that people would run to buy.
Elfkins uses the beautiful animation to bring the story to life, filled with the darker colors of the underground world, the bright designs of the big city of Cologne that gets brought to life, as well as using the color palette to show us the changes Theo must make his bakery to get back to what it was once in his dreams.
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