Linnea in Monet’s Garden   (Children/Animation)

 

Picture: C+     Sound: C+     Extras: C-     Program: B-

 

 

The market for high quality children’s programming has been a holy grail for parents since the advent of Sesame Street and Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood, and home video made it more relevant.  Now, with DVD, this has kicked into high gear.  One of the most interesting titles is Linnea in Monet’s Garden (1993), based on the children’s book about a young girl who loves the paintings of the Impressionist giant.

 

Rendered mostly as an animated program, Linnea and her good friend Mr. Bloom take a journey into the world of art, then literally travel to Monet’s actual garden.  With occasional live action shots, including (obviously) those of the actual paintings, the 30-minutes-long work could go on even longer as it is very engaging.  It respects the intelligence of the younger audience, but can be appreciated by all.  The animation is nicely drawn, the characters very well voiced.

 

The full screen image is not bad for an older analog transfer, with decent colors and definition that is not as soft as one might expect.  Even the art on the box, clearer as it is, does not do justice to how nicely this plays back.  The Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is fine for its age and all talking is articulate enough.  The only extra is a quiz for kids to see if they got that fine (and fun) points of the program.

 

Lena Anderson and Christina Bjork are the original book authors and are the writer/directors here, which is likely why the charm and joy of their work stays so much in tact.  This really ought to be a series, and if it already is, more DVDs should be issued because there is simply not enough children’s material out there of this high quality.  Linnea in Monet’s Garden belongs in all children’s libraries, and is even fine for boys, who also deserve such exposure to the art world.

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo