A [favourite] animated character for Donald Duck Day (USA)

“In the evenings, the little Hedgehog went to the Bear Cub to count stars. They would sit on the log and sip tea, gazing at the starry sky. It hung on the roof, just behind the chimney. To the right of the chimney were the Bear Cub's stars and the stars to the left were the Hedgehog's”

– opening lines

On his way to visit his friend Bear Cub, Hedgehog finds himself in a dense mistbank. Strange sounds, and even stranger creatures, omit from it. And all he wanted was have strawberry jam and tea with his friend.

A pet for National Hug Your Cat Day (USA) *

“Had I the time to keep a diary, I’d use that time to better effect; sleeping on the veranda”

– The cat

A school teacher's house cat observes and comments his household's going-ons as a microcosm of Japan's paradoxical Meiji period. The second adaptation of Sōseki Natsume's 1900s satirical novel.

 

* The event falls on June 4

A film ithrah69 may like for their birthday.

 

Filmmaker and photographer Colomb de Daunant's spiritual sequel to Crin blanc : le cheval sauvage [White Mane] (1953) and Glamador (1958) follows the same wild Camargue horses in their dreams.

 

The accompanying music is performed on a Cristal Baschet, a glass instrument key to several avant-garde films. I refer to John Coulthart's writeup about Le Songe, which links through to an article about the Cristal Baschet.

Imaginary animals or food for Theodor “Dr.” Seuss Geisel's birthday (1904).

“I like the settings where the lights and desire cross path. The desire to communicate with the invisibles in the darkness, or in memory, or in the future. It's always related to cinema and we as insects that are drawn to lights.”

– Apichatpong Weerasethakul, via

Villagers in the north of Thailand reported a rare sighting of a male and female Nok Phii, an elusive species of bird that feeds on animals' blood. It is unknown if the sighting was reliable, and if this vampire does, or ever did, exist.

Wild animals for this year's first National Wildlife Day (USA). A second one is on September 4.

“For me, Afrikareise is, in its own genre, the most intense sound film that exists. Sound and images are in synch like in nature (even if it isn’t about the natural sound of something). The sound becomes the acoustic portrait of the visual action.”

– Peter Kubelka, via

Commissioned to film a rich Austrian couple's hunting trip, Kubelka sat on the material for several years before editing it in something more than the sum of its parts.

Someone owns a pet on Love Your Pet Day (UK)

“I'm sharing my husband with a cat. This is humiliating!”

– Nakajima

Shōzō is torn between his ex-wife and his current spouse, but really just wants to spend time with Lily, his cat.

Snakes (巳) in celebration of Lunar New Year.

 

Ormen is an adaptation of the first two chapters of the novel Berättelsen om Iréne (Stig Dagerman, 1945).

 

In an army barrack, a sergeant is bitten by a snake. A soldier hides the animal in his bag in order to blackmail his superior. Iréne – who works in the same barrack's mess and is the soldier's lover – pushes her mother off a train during a quarrel about the daughter's lack of morals.

 

Dagerman's novel is a metaphor of Sweden's uncomfortable position in a post-WW2 world (it had declared itself neutral, which by default made it complicit in helping the Nazis). Due to its violence and nudity, outside its homecountry the film adaptation mostly played porn theatres.

A funnily dressed pet for National Dress Up Your Pet Day (USA) (please don't!).

– Now, see! You kill-a de monk! – Pay him for that baboon… or I'll run you in!

After cameraman Buster accidentally knocks over a monkey, he has no choice but to take the sailor-suited simian along on his movie shoots.

Drums for Junkanoo.

Pagans for Yule. The reindeer plays an important part in Sámi #animism (1/2).