Birthday Boy
Korean War, 1951 Little Manuk is playing on the streets of his village and dreaming of life at the front where his father is a soldier. He returns home to find a parcel on the doorstep and, thinking it is a birthday present, he opens it. But its contents will change his life.
CinemaSerf@Geronimo1967
I thought that there was something quite evocative about this short animation. It's his birthday, and a young Korean lad is playing in the wreckage of an aircraft that has crashed into a nearby house. With his father away fighting in the war, his son is dreaming of joining him. Enjoying his own shadow war games, imagining he is shooting the enemy as they approach his position. Then he heads home and discovers a parcel on their veranda. It’s fairly clear to us what the contents mean, but does “Manuk” appreciate their significance? This is quite a potent feature that illustrates something of a life growing up with the effects of war all around. Whether that’s weaponry that’s served a purpose already, or scenes of trains carrying yet more to the front, we sense this boy’s rural life will never be the same again. The question is, though, has he already outgrown his own youthful innocence? The perspective of his games are presented from his own point of view and from our observations and the style of animation works sympathetically with the topic without sentimentalising it and it makes for quite a powerful ten minutes that might offer us an explanation as to why war never, ever, leaves us.