Moonbird (1959)
Moonbird Review
Moonbird is a 1959 animated short that won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film for that year.
It follows two boys who in the middle of the night sneak out in order to find and catch the Moonbird. Now apparently the film is a unique experiment as it featured real child voices which came from the director’s own children and he taped their imaginary adventure and created a film around it. Now that premise and that approach is, needless to say, incredibly original and the film is admirable for it.
However, everything else here is disappointing. The film is a technical mess with the animation that is very subpar and the character design which is not the greatest. The sound wasn’t that well incorporated and the film doesn’t sound or look good. Plus it is overlong and not particularly engaging to watch. It is such a poor execution of a great premise.
Moonbird is original and an interesting, but not particularly successful or polished film.
