Younger daughter got to work in their animation section, and chose, among other things, a couple of National Film Board of Canada collections. I think she finds them soothing, like a cocktail before dinner.
It occurred to me, while she was re-watching them recently, that I pay precious little attention to the soundtrack of animated shorts, the images are too distracting, I guess.
In the 1993 Academy-Award-winning Bob's Birthday, for example, there are several arresting images. And I should warn you, this cartoon got censored in the United States. (Nothing enough to get it censored in Canada, but you'll see what I mean.)
It was only when younger daughter had this on a few weeks ago, that I realised that Bob recites excerpts of two poems. You hear him murmur "There is a garden in her face" (written by Thomas Campion and published in 1617), as he gazes out at his dental assistant, who is losing the war against aphids.
At the very end, blissfully unaware of the social havoc he has wrought, he recites the final three lines from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's sonnet "The Poets", while waiting for his wife in their car.
All of which seems to indicate the importance of revisiting books, movies, poems, and animated shorts, if you want to catch the details you missed. Or am I just as oblivious as Bob?
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