OK
1996
By Brit Fadnes, Bente Forstrøm & Kirsti Leira
On Own Two Feet
Synopsis
A newborn lies on its back, its movements still wild and uncontrolled. Its head must be held by an adult, and looking is everything. On its belly the baby struggles to lift its head, rolls over by accident, and pushes itself round in circles. At first it crawls backwards, and it needs comfort and support. A ball helps.
Then it is up on all fours, swaying, stretching its back, and learning to coordinate arms and legs. It pulls itself up on whatever it can hold, walks along the furniture, and falls down again and again. It is lucky its legs are short.
In one and a half minutes, the child goes from helplessness to standing on its own two feet, and walks out into the everyday life of a family.
Credits
THE COMMISSION: To animate a 1½ minute intro to an educational film
IDEA AND SCRIPT: Brit Fadnes, Bente Forstrøm & Kirsti Leira
ANIMATION (DRAWINGS): Anita Killi, Trollfilm AS
INSTRUCTION AND TEXT DEVELOPER: Endre Skar
PHOTO DIRECTOR: Trygve Berge
PHOTO: Svein Roger Ivarsen
PRODUCER: Berge Film & TV-Produksjon AS
COMMISSIONER: Fylkessjukehuset in Molde, att. Brit Fadnes
SUPPORTED BY: Sosial- og helsedepartementet v/Forebyggings-og utviklingsavdelingen and Fylkessjukehuset i Molde
Awards
Year
Prize
Award
Result
Mission
On Own Two Feet looks at the link between how we experience our bodies and how we see ourselves. Self-esteem starts in the body, from a babyâs first attempts to lift its head to the moment it stands up by itself. The film shows children and adults how this connection works, and how we express ourselves and act through words and through movement.
The film covers subjects that most families know well: quarrelling, overprotection, stomach pain, intuition and the joy of mastering something new. Three physiotherapists, who between them are mothers to thirteen children, made it as their third educational film. Their trained eye picks up things most of us never notice. Simply by watching a small child move, they can learn a great deal about how it is doing.
The film is made for everyone who has children or works with them. It is used in teaching across school subjects, for young people and adults, and in higher education. At parent meetings in schools and kindergartens it works as a starting point for conversation and reflection. It is not meant to give final answers. It is meant to open further conversations.
About the film
On Own Two Feet is an educational film of about 50 minutes, made by three physiotherapists. Anita Killi was commissioned to animate a babyâs physical development from birth to its first steps, all within one and a half minutes. After that, the animation moves into the everyday life of a family.
For Killi, the job was an excellent exercise in studying how a small child moves. She had no children of her own at the time. Since then she has become a mother of four, and she has enjoyed recognising each stage. She says the commission was where her own thinking began about film as something more than entertainment. What she learned about how we use the body to express ourselves has stayed with her and shaped her later films.
The sequence is classic hand-drawn animation. Each drawing was first made on ordinary copy paper and line-tested. It was then copied onto grey paper, hole-punched so it would line up exactly under the camera, and coloured with coloured pencils. At 12 drawings per second, the 90-second sequence needed 1,080 drawings. You can read more about the technique in Circle.
