[jekylljuice]

Dot and the Kangaroo

This has to be quite possibly one of the saddest and most haunting animated films that I've ever seen. Really, if I'd stumbled across this fifteen years ago or more, I supsect that I'd have had a very hard time handling it. Unfortunately, the video transference upon the disc I was watching it on wasn't brilliant, so I don't think I got full benefit of all those subtlely-sketched natural backgrounds, which included some input from the great Spike Milligan, although the film actually seemed to consist of a combination of hand-drawn backgrounds and animated characters added to actual 3D backdrops, which in that sense reminded me a lot of When the Wind Blows (which also ranks as one of the most heart-breaking animated films I've ever seen, albeit for vastly different reasons).

The story follows the adventures of a young girl named Dot who gets lost in the Australian outback, where she finds herself deeply out of her element, until a friendly red kangaroo, still mourning the loss of her own offspring, comes to her aid. From there on in, a series of encounters with representatives of the local wildlife ensue, some of whom are sympathetic to Dot's plight, others less so. I would guess that one of the key intentions behind this film was to provide Australian children with an introduction to the vast array of wierd and wonderful creatures with whom they share their native land. Some of these sequences are incorporated well into the story, such as that of the platypus (sorry, Ornithorhynchus anatinus), while others, such as the frogs', constitute whimsical little tangents, but all of it merges together to form a very satisfactory and powerful experience. Still, if you're going to watch it, then you'd do well to have a box of tissues set aside for the end. The final outcome is kind of inevitable from the start, but it still packs one heck of a punch when it happens. Then again, I'm easily moved.