Animated Discussions: My Dog Tulip

So we sits down and watches a DVD of "My Dog Tulip"which The Old Man is most insistant gets purchased.

"My Dog Tulip", released earlier this year in UK, is an animated tale based on J.R. Ackerley's memoir of his long relationship with his German Shepherd, Queenie (Tulip). It took Paul Fierlinger & Sandra Fierlinger six years to animate using what they call "paperless" animation (drawn and painted straight into the computer.)

I love it. Laughing out loud and really enjoying The Fierlingers' chosen style which reminds me of magazine caricature of the period (1950s). But in some sequences, usually when Ackerley (voiced by Christopher Plummer) is musing on Tulip's inner life, this morphs into animated line drawings depicting Tulip as a dog -headed human in a dress. Sucker for that touch, me.

Be warned that this is not a cute film about a cute dog. Although in her own way Tulip is cute, she is most certainly DOG. And it is this that seems to divide critical opinion. It seems that Tulip is just too basic in her vital expressions, pee, crap, reproduction, etc - and that J.R. Ackerly appears to be too fascinated by her habits to be quite respectable.

But I think it's a truthful, loving, detailed observation of the dog and her solitary human companion. So I say... bravo for "My Dog Tulip".... not a dry eye in the house... thoroughly moved I be. See it if you can.