Animation 09 Jan 2008 08:29 am
Mouse & His Child
- Reviewing the career of Lu Guarnier, yesterday, I saw the title, The Mouse and His Child. This Russell Hoban book is an absoulte gem – a GREAT book. The film wasn’t quite its equal, but because the story is so brilliant, the film isn’t bad. Too bad they cut the last third of the book out of the film and ended the story early. Hoban told me that he hated what they did to his book, but I still like it.
The film was done by Sanrio, a Japanese company that made all their money on Hello Kitty products. They produced two features in the US. Metamorphosis and The Mouse and His Child. Both films failed at the box office.
However, The Mouse and His Child, directed by Fred Wolf and Chuck Swenson, has some real charm. There are small glimmers of exciting animation throughout the film.
I don’t really know who did any of it. Corny Cole, obviously, did the big closing animated zoom of the film. I sought out the work of one animator I liked, and it turned out to be Vincent Davis. It was the first work I saw by him, and I’m still charmed by it.
Here’s a small walk at the beginning of the film. Lots of shape shifting in the assisting, but there’s something nice about it, too. I don’t know who animated it.
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I like this film; I’ll probably have a bunch more to say about it eventually.
on 09 Jan 2008 at 8:57 pm 1.David Nethery said …
Michael you just brought back a memory for me . I had forgotten about this film. I watched this film many times when it aired on HBO back in the late 70′s /early 80′s . I haven’t seen it since that time , but I remember it having some good animation, although the story sort of meandered , as I recall.
If I recall it was somewhat spiritual and metaphorical . I’ll have to look for the book. Oddly enough I’ve never read the book , though I have other books by Russell Hoban (and his then wife Lillian) .
I like the Hoban’s books . ( I always thought Frances would have been good animation material . Did anyone every animate Frances? )
on 12 Jun 2011 at 3:32 am 2.Chris Sobieniak said …
Apart from the two films Sanrio financed in the US, they had set up studio back in Japan that produced other animated films that also saw some releases in the US through home video and pay TV including “Ringing Bell”, “The Sea Prince & The Fire Child”, “The Nutcracker Fantasy” and two films based on Osamu Tezuka’s “Unico” character. Most recently a video company over here had licensed the rights to release “The Sea Prince & The Fire Child” on DVD and it’s worth at least a peek at Masami Hata’s work as a director of a very lavish, if not interesting take on Romeo & Juliet.
on 12 Jun 2011 at 8:40 am 3.Chris Sobieniak said …
The moment that just came to me I liked in the film was when Manny goes insane and crushes the two mice with a rock. We see him moving the rock away with his foot, bends down to check out what he did and comes down to check something and realized what he did and shrugs away from the crime. Kinda wonder who animated that one myself!