Strings (1991 film)
Strings is a 1991 Canadian paint-on-glass animation short film by Wendy Tilby, produced by the National Film Board of Canada.
Summary
[edit]The 10 min. 23 sec. animated short simultaneously follows a woman preparing for a bath and her downstairs neighbour rehearsing with his string quartet. who is also the owner of the property, exploring the connections between these two neighbours. The film garnered numerous awards, including the Genie Award for Best Animated Short and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film.[1][2][3][4] It was also included in the Animation Show of Shows.[5]
Plot
[edit]Set in London back in the late 1930s a middle aged woman and an elderly man were getting into a lift he gets off on the second floor and she gets off on the third floor, as each gets into their own flats she was walking towards her bathroom and she run the water in her bathtub and she goes over to a scale model of the Titanic completing it with the fourth smokestacks and strings. Meanwhile inside the his flat downstairs from hers he was preparing food for catering before his quartet members arrive in a taxi cab. As soon as they arrive, they get his flat and then they uncase their violins and violas and they start rehearsing the music. Back upstairs to her flat she turns off the water in her bathtub and she throws in a Bath bomb and a floating toy ship that also resembles the Titanic she undresses and gets comfortable in her bath she is unaware that her bathtub is causing a leak through the hole in her floor around her drain pipe causing water to drip into his flat from his chandelier and he notices the water dripping from his ceiling as the water drips on to the sardines he decided he needs to go up there and fix it as it turns out he’s also the owner and caretaker of the property wile the other musicians keep playing. she is in the bathtub relaxing thinking about the titanic at night and all the people dancing on board the ship and she was interrupted by her door buzzer and she got out of her bath to go see who it is and she opened the door and she saw the elderly man who lives downstairs and she saw the tool box in his hand and she somehow now realizes that something needs to be fixed so she lets him in and he makes his way to the bathroom to fix the hole in her bathroom floor. Meanwhile, back in his flat the chandelier breaks and falls from the ceiling landing on the table with the catering of fish and fruits, after which the other musicians packed up their instruments and headed for the Cab and left and even with a damaged kitchen table and with a chandelier all over the place he continues playing his violin all by himself and she is now back in her relaxing bath
In other media
[edit]Tilby also appeared in an NFB short film, Wendy Tilby with Strings, talking about the creative process behind the film.[6]
References
[edit]- ^ "Strings". National Film Board of Canada Web site. Retrieved 2009-07-05.
- ^ Cuthbert, Pamela. "Wendy Tilby". Canadian Film Encyclopedia. Film Reference Library. Archived from the original on 2007-10-12. Retrieved 2009-07-05.
- ^ Short Film Winners: 1992 Oscars
- ^ 1992|Oscars.org
- ^ The Full Collection-Box Sets 1-9 of The Animation Show of Shows
- ^ McWilliams, Donald; Isabelle Turcotte (1994). "Wendy Tilby with Strings". National Film Board of Canada Web site. Retrieved 2009-07-05.
External links
[edit]- Watch Strings on the NFB website
- Excerpt on Vimeo
- Strings on YouTube
- 1991 films
- Paint-on-glass animated films
- Canadian animated short films
- Films shot in Montreal
- Films directed by Wendy Tilby
- National Film Board of Canada animated short films
- Best Animated Short Film Genie and Canadian Screen Award winners
- 1991 animated short films
- Animated films without speech
- 1990s Canadian animated films
- Animated films about cats