Animateka 2017
Window Horse: The Poetic Persian Epiphany of Rosie Ming)
Window Horse: The Poetic Persian Epiphany of Rosie Ming)
Ann Marie Fleming / Canada / 2016 / 85 min / English
Rosie Ming, a young Canadian poet, is invited to perform at a Poetry Festival in Shiraz, Iran, but she’d rather be in Paris. She lives with her over-protective Chinese grandparents and has never been anywhere by herself. Once in Iran, she finds herself in the company of poets and Persians, all of them telling her stories that force her to confront her past, the truth about her Iranian father she assumed abandoned her, and the nature of Poetry itself. It’s about building bridges between cultural and generational divides. It’s about being curious. Staying open. And finding your own voice through the magic of poetry.
Written and directed by Ann Marie Fleming, Original Music Taymaz Saba, Lead Design and Animation Kevin Langdale, Sound Design & Supervisor Gordon Durity, Editorial Team Ann Marie Fleming, Ileana Pietrobruno, Jean-Denis Rouette, Voices Sandra Oh, Shohreh Aghdashloo, Ellen Page, Executive Producer Sandra Oh, Producer Ann Marie Fleming, Shirley Vercruysse, Michael Fukushima, Production Stick Girl Productions, NFB, Distribution National Film Board of Canada
IMDb
"The idea for Window Horses actually started about 20 years ago, when I was in an artists’ residency in Stuttgart, staying with poets and writers, mainly, and listening to their stories of diaspora – particularly after the Second World War – and how the generations in families often didn’t pass on their stories. [...] So the story was originally a Canadian/German one, because that’s where I was."
"The film has Kevin’s flavor, but that is where the world of the film started from. And then we brought on board about 20 animators. And each one took a story or poem, and animated in their unique style. Because the film’s all about learning about other points of view and looking at things in different ways. Being an animator myself, this was not an industrial process. Animators are just very slow actors. And working with professional actors was such a pleasure too."
- Ann Marie Fleming