Recently, I learned of a short film entitled The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore awarded the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film. Intrigued by it’s “hybrid style of animation” and the fact that the author/illustrator also created an animated book as a companion to the film, I paid the exorbitant $4.99 and downloaded the app.
This animated short film is brilliant. For anyone who has maintained a close relationship with books throughout life, you will have a significant connection to the masterfully constructed story. My biggest surprise; however, did not come from the film itself, but came when I opened (or more precisely swiped) the pages of the electronic picture book included with the application. I have to admit that I started reading the book with a bit of prejudice against polluting such a classic art form with electronic media, but was pleasantly surprised even mesmerized.
Perhaps to better understand why this is significant, it is important that I reveal my personal love affair with picture books. In my opinion, most picture books are actually created for the adults who share them with children. In a well written children’s book, the author purposefully utilizes his words and creates a tenacious marriage of illustration and story. I enjoy physically turning each page, sharing each illustration and rendering my personal voice to the piece. It is within the pages of an exceptional picture book you find rich vocabulary and writing craft from which young writers can learn. If you were to visit my middle school classroom, you would find an entire bookcase devoted to picture books used as mentor text for my students.
So when I opened the first pages of The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, I expected to be disappointed, but I was not. I was, in fact, captivated. It is a story of “people who devote their lives to books and books who return the favor”- a subject that would naturally draw me in. It is also a tale of folks who love words and writing. My favorite page from the book reads: “Morris Lessmore loved words. He loved stories. He loved books. His life was a book of his own writing, one orderly page after another. He would open it every morning and write of his joys and sorrows, of all that he knew and everything he hoped.” I have since wondered how I could get those last words painted on my classroom wall.
The film (click the title to view): The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore
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