牧羊犬郁金香

It was Roger Ebert's highly favorable review led me to this little animation dog film, adapted by Paul Fierlinger and Sandra Fierlinger from J.R.Ackerley's 1956 memoir with the same title, voice over by Christopher Plummer, Lynn Redgrave and Isabella Rossellini. Released June 10, 2009.

It's a story about companionship between an old lonely man with his unruly female German shepherd dog whom he had rescued in her 18th month in 1947. The story is told in such a minute way involving every detail of the canine bodily function: almost one third of the length was on urinating and defecating, remaining two third was mating detail -- for someone never have kept a pet before these too intimate informaton made me more than a little uncomfortable, ha, my bad. However the film is thoroughly enjoyable, the painting are beautiful and simple done by paperless system but retains a strong hand-drawn flavour, the odd and dry humour permeated through the film prevented it being ever oversentimental, and what counts the most, it touches that string deep in our hearts that in this overcrowded and lonely world, all we need is love, wherever we can find it.

Quotes:

Unable to love each other, the English turn naturally to dogs.

It seems to me, both touching and strange, that she should find the world so wonderful.

Whatever blunders I may have commited in my management of my animal's life, she lived on to the great age of sixteen and half. I was a bit drained in spirit when Tulip came into my hands, and the fifteen years she lived with me turned into the happiest of my life. She entered my life when I was quite over 50, and she entirely transformed it. She offered me what I have never found in my life with humans, constant single-hearted incorruptable uncritical devotion, which it is in the nature of dogs to offer. She placed herself entirely under my control. Looking at her sometimes in her later years, I used to think that the ideal friend whom I no longer wanted, perhaps never wanted, would have the mind of my Tulip. Always at one's service through the devotion of a faithful and uncritical beast, are not all human contacts based upon one person's wish to claim the affairs of another? Everyone it seemes wishs everyone else different from what they are.

What strained and anxious lives dogs must lead, so emotionally involved in the world of human, whose affections they strive endlessly to secure, whose authority they are expected unquestioningly to obey, and whose mind they can never do more than imperfectly reach and comprehend. Stupidly loved, stupidly hated, acquired without thought, reared and rules wihtout understanding, passed on or 'put to sleep' without care, did they, I wondered, these descendants of the creatures who, thousands of years ago in the primeval forests, laid siege to the heart of man, took him under their protection, tried to tame him, and failed...did they suffer from headaches?

男人无老婆，养只狗也能行。片子讲述一只狗和主人的伴侣生涯。这只狗最后先走一步，却让主人写了一本书来纪念，两个家伙都能由此名垂青史，也不辜负十几年的同甘共苦。本以为这样的作品应该煽情至观众黯然泪下，结果却是一个冷静得让人到处找痒痒挠儿的结局。这样的手笔确实挺英国的。

片子里面有很多很露骨的狗的性生活，画得不失幽默，但是这部分内容有点拖沓，看着看着不知道自己到底是在看人狗伙伴关系，还是在看动物色情片。给狗找对象成了电影的主要部分，伴随的是主人啰嗦怪癖的性格。那个絮叨劲儿确实让人想起常在英国公园里转悠，穿着皱了吧唧的西装，在寒风里用手绢呜呜地擤鼻涕的英国老大爷。

片子从头到尾有旁白讲述，动画仿佛是插图。说是传统风格，却也有形式上的突破。总体感觉，动画设计有很多有意思的细节。画面中有很多英国元素，红公共汽车、黑色出租车、泰晤士河，还有那个有名的Batersea电厂....一看就是要给美国人看的片子。不过，居然出现明显的史实错误：那种后开口的红色公共汽车（Routemaster)是在1956年才开始在伦敦使用的。在此之前虽然也有Routemaster，但是应该是有门，或者是前面开口的。而不是电影里面后面开口的这种。而这部片子的原作在1956年就完成了。片子一开始有作者采访丘吉尔的镜头，说明应该是战争时期就有了这个狗。原作一直写到狗去世，所以狗在红汽车诞生之前就去世了。电影所涉及的年份根本不应该有红公共汽车。

嘿嘿

    For as long as I could remember, I had been searching for an ideal friend. But I have never really found the person who fitted my exacting requirements. There was always some flaw, too tall, too short, too outgoing, too shy, too insecure, too independent... As the years passed and the opportunities grew fewer, I had a mental image of the ideal friend as a plain jug containing a delightful mix of good companionship and intellectual stimulation, the shape, age and size of which no longer had any importance for me. I still felt that if I only turned this corner instead of that or boarded this bus rather than that one, I would find the ideal friend waiting for me and that we would reconize each other at once after the exchange of a few words. Ah, and a further complication was that I did not want anyone to think that I was pursuing them. It was therefore necessary to encounter the ideal friend face-to-face, which is not easy if you happen both to be moving in the same direction.