This week’s mystery movie was the French animated feature Le Roi et L’Oiseau (The King and the Mockingbird), after La Bergere et la Ramoneur by Hans Christian Andersen.
Scenario by Jacques Prevert and Paul Grimault.
Dialogue by Jacques Prevert.
Music by Wojciech Kilar.
A film by Paul Grimault, dedicated to Jacques Prevert.
Voices by Jean Martin, Pascal Mazzotti, Raymond Bussieres, Agnes Viala, Renaud Marx, Hubert Deschamps, Roger Blin, Philippe Derrez, Albert Medina and Claude Pieplu.
Further information (in French) on The King and the Mockingbird, which has had numerous titles in its life, is available via Lantern also here.
Le Roi et L’Oiseau is available on DVD from Amazon, but check the region carefully. It’s also available on Daily Motion, but with the wrong aspect ratio.
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I picked Le Roi et L’Oiseau after seeing it mentioned by one of the animators I follow on Instagram. The movie is beautiful and strange, with haunting images and memorable music; uneven in places because of its complicated history. But it certainly deserves a wider audience. Its message is definitely one for our time.
Writing in The New York Times (November 21, 2014), Ben Kenigsberg said:
The French animated film The King and the Mockingbird has been more influential than known or seeable, at least in the United States. The movie is belatedly opening here in a subtitled restoration, with special dubbed showings for children.
Released in France in the 1950s in a version that the animator Paul Grimault called “an imposter” and completed, after an overhaul, in 1979, The King and the Mockingbird is commonly cited as an influence on Studio Ghibli, from Japan. Yet in its humor, its fairy tale origins and characters’ rounded features, it plays more like a vintage Disney work, only nimbler and freer….
…A catalog of the movie’s pleasures barely does justice to this lost-and-found delight.
This week’s mystery movie is something I rarely do, which is animation.
For Tuesday, we have some mysterious fellows.
Note to Sylvia: You’re on the right track!
For Wednesday, we have a very large, mysterious and contemplative robot!
For Thursday, we have a mysterious organ grinder.
And a mysterious couple.
Brain Trust roll call: Sylvia (mystery movie, mysterious director and several interesting observations about our mysterious film).
For Friday, we have a mysterious king.
And a mysterious mockingbird.
Brain Trust roll call: Sylvia with more information about our mysterious animated feature.
ladailymirror.com 
Disney’s SONG OF THE SOUTH with Brother Wolf on the warpath.
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An interesting guess! But alas, I’m afraid not.
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Monday is always a tough day.
This image looks almost like a parody, of the Looney Tunes parody, of Elmer Fudd as a hunter performing on stage in an opera. Definitely not Looney Tunes though (the character’s hands in this image have 5 fingers instead of 4).
There was an animated TV show version of Attack of the Killer Tomatoes. Character designs had 5 fingered hands, too. Hmmm…
After all of the above, I really have no idea. Will await Tuesday’s image.
I bet Jenny will know right away.
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Now I think the Monday image is of a framed painting on the wall being revealed and an OS character has thrown something onto it.
Still no idea what the movie might be. Back to waiting for Tuesday’s image.
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The Curious Adventures of Mr Wonderbird 1952
Directed by Paul Grimault.
Looks amazing.
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It’s interesting to compare not only the French/ English voices of the 1952 release, but also the French/English voices of the 1980 version. I think they all changed. Usually that’s related to availability of the actor, but maybe the director didn’t care for anything at all in the earlier version (the release of which he did not sign off on). He was unhappy with the ’52 release, saying it was unfinished, but most reviewers of both say the ’80 stuff didn’t add particularly to the tale…sooo, who knows.
The English voices in the ’52 version were very good I thought. Quite a cast. Anouk Aimee was the only name I recognized for the French voices. She and Claire Bloom did the voice of the Shepherdess. Denholm Elliot and Serge Reggiani did the voice of the Chimney sweep. Peter Ustinov and Pierre Brasseur did the voice of the Bird. Max Adrian and Ferdnand Ledoux voiced the King.
Thursday’s English voice (the blind man – Organ Grinder) is Alec Clunes (Father of ‘Doc Martin’, Martin Clunes), a nice surprise!
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I should be clearer and say that the English “voice casting” looks great, not that I found the English voiced version. The clip I found had segments of Mr Ustinov as the Bird and he’s a treat.
I didn’t recognize any of the French actors other than Ms Aimee. I’m guessing that she was great.
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The King and the Mockingbird (1980)
Written by Hans Christian Andersen and Paul Grimault (also directed).
Unfortunately, I have never seen this film.
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the king and the mockingbird. I had never heard of it. It looks like a hodgepodge of animation styles, as if multiple people got fired along the way.
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Friday – in the 1952 version:
The king (English) Max Adrian, who’s been described as an ‘over the top’ comic Irish actor
The bird(English) Peter Ustinov
It’s been fun learning about this movie. Had never heard of it before.
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Well now I know why the king looked familiar but none of the other photos did: A couple weeks ago I watched a Quebecois animation on YouTube called CRAC! (1980) because I’d read it had been highly praised by Hideo Miyazaki, and in recommendations was a video about THE KING AND THE MOCKINGBIRD, which Miyazaki had also seen in the same year, and the thumbnail for the YouTube video was a picture of the king. What a coincidence! Absolutely would never have remembered it on my own, though, only when I went to see if this was on YT did I see the thumbnail again and realized what had happened.
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Crac! is wonderful too!
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