Module 7 When The Wind Blows

When The Wind Blows is an animated film about a couple who are going through a nuclear bomb threat. This is a rare and unique cartoon since it is not humorous. After watching it for several minutes I thought this was a well done film but not done in the correct medium. Then, I realized their choice for choosing animation.

When The Wind Blows also has some shots from real life. For example, bombs, soldiers and people from real life. They also integrated some real life artifacts such as pillows in the same shot as the animated scenes. I think this is symbolism reminding the audiences that, unlike the animations, the film and topic are real.

Usually, cartoons are made to make everything seem fake, simple and funny. They are often used for the targeted audience of children. Or, they are also often used for visual effects, such as making people or characters burn and turn to ashes, an anvil falling on someone and squishing them, and expressing unique features on things and characters in an over exaggerated fashion. When The Wind Blows does not need any of that at all. This is why I did not like the fact that it was a cartoon, but then I realized it. I realized that with the live-action shots, the cartoons put us in a light mood and then once the live-action shots appear, we notice the sudden seriousness of this topic of nuclear warfare and the horrific things that it brings.

According to an animator magazine called Animator, issue 19 (Summer 1987), When The Wind Blows is an adaptation of an illustrated novel which contained many cartoon illustrations that look like the ones in the film. This must have been the main reason the film was animated as it was. But Animator brings up some good points about this that choosing the cartoon medium was a terrible idea. This is because with the drawn spotted lined cartoons, we do not see facial expressions well at all and in such a dramatic heartfelt story like this, we must see facial expressions to feel what the characters are feeling. The film just was not graphic enough to have the success as the novel did, according to Animator. As Animator continues, the film used every word in the novel as its script, which is good for the book and also worked for the radio play, but it does not translate to the screen well. I totally agree with this, film is a visual medium and I felt as though this film was extremely dialogue heavy; it did not need to by a film with a script like this. I needed to see the expressions of fear and mystery, not be told it.

The sound of the film was extremely good with so many minor sound effects sounding real and going with the action. However, the actual animation itself was poor. The best animated scene in the film was after the bomb hit, when the cars were crashing into each other and everything went flying, with the change of colors. Despite the good scary animation, the music ruined this with a song by David Bowie. Animator agrees with me on this “The message, fortunately, is more powerful than the medium.” (http://www.animatormag.com/archive/issue-19/issue-19-page-11/)