SNAPSHOT
Summer is about to end, and while fruit is growing ripe on the trees, Grandpa gives his beloved Grandson a kite. The kite is strong and tosses the boy around in the air, but Grandpa catches him. Leaves begin to fall and Grandpa has grown weak. The srong autumn wind carries him off into the cloudy sky. Seasons change, from Winter to Spring, and a warm breeze brings them together again. An enchanting tale about remembering those who are no longer with us. (courtesy YouTube (c) MAGNETFILM)
Losing someone special to you is one of the biggest emotional body blows life can deliver to you.
You have lost someone who filled your days with love and wonder, who gave you a sense of love and belonging and who gave you endlessly special moments that won’t ever come around again.
It’s a desolate time and one that The Kite (Pouštět draka / Šarkan), a short film directed by Martin Smatana with production by Peter Badač, captures all its wondrously melancholic detail.
We watch as a grandson and grandfather, brought to life by animation so richly quirky and evocatively cute that it enchants, along with the music, the moment the film starts, spend countless hours together, most notably flying a kite that seems to have a gorgeous life all of its own.
Theirs is a special bond and one realised in the 2019 film so beguilingly well that it takes your heart right along with it, and when, one day, the grandfather flies up into the sky leaving the young boy alone with his memories and the happily rediscovered kite, you feel as bereft as the kid.
But then the grandfather seems to reappear, and while we know it can only be the result of the grandson remembering what his grandfather was like and what he meant to him, the joy of seeming them reunited is joyously if melancholically palpable.
The Kite (Pouštět draka / Šarkan) is a transcendent joy because it recognises that loss and life are inextricably intertwined and that while losing someone is desperately, tragically sad, we keep those precious, heartwarming memories which will sustain us when the person we made them with is no longer with us.
Here are some beautiful behind-the-scenes videos (for part 1 go to YouTube) …
Part 3
Part 4