Siren (1968 Film)
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''Siren'' () is a 1968 Belgian animated short film written and directed by Raoul Servais. Set in a harbour city dominated by mechanical beasts and reason, it is about the encounter between a boy and a
mermaid In folklore, a mermaid is an aquatic creature with the head and upper body of a female human and the tail of a fish. Mermaids appear in the folklore of many cultures worldwide, including Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Mermaids are ...
. The nine and a half minutes long film was produced with support from the
Flemish Community The Flemish Community (, ) is one of the three institutional communities of Belgium, established by the Belgian constitution and having legal responsibilities only within the precise geographical boundaries of the Dutch-language area and of the ...
and received a number of awards at international film festivals.


Plot

In a harbour, large mechanical cranes lift boxes full of weapons while behaving like aggressive beasts. Flying reptiles circle in the sky and steal from a lone fisherman's catch, which consists solely of fishbones. A cabin boy at a ship plays flute and his music attracts a
mermaid In folklore, a mermaid is an aquatic creature with the head and upper body of a female human and the tail of a fish. Mermaids appear in the folklore of many cultures worldwide, including Europe, Latin America, Asia, and Africa. Mermaids are ...
to the surface, but the cranes aggressively sink their hooks and claws into the water and she tries to escape. One of the cranes captures her, lifts her high into the air and drops her to the quayside. The fisherman rushes to a phonebooth and calls for
emergency service Emergency services and rescue services are organizations that ensure public safety, security, and health by addressing and resolving different emergencies. Some of these agencies exist solely for addressing certain types of emergencies, while oth ...
, prompting policemen and government officials to examine the already dead mermaid. They destroy the fisherman's fishing permit and arrest him. Two vans arrive: an ambulance and one with " zoo" written on it, and their respective personnel begin to fight over the mermaid's body. A man representing the law cuts her body in half, allowing the ambulance to leave with her human upper body and the zoo workers with her fishtail. The boy goes to the white outline initially drawn around the mermaid's dead body and draws his own image next to it, holding her hand. The contour of a ship forms in the starry sky, picks up the drawn figures and flies away with them as the boy plays his flute.


Themes

The story in ''Siren'' is told on two levels, where reality and dramatic action are represented by red colours, and dreams, the romantic and the sentimental by blue colours. Manuela Rosignoli wrote in a 2006 academic paper that ''Siren'' uses a theme of duality, represented by the half-human mermaid, that runs through much of Raoul Servais' filmography and which she traces to Belgium's division between Dutch-language Flemish and French-language Walloon culture. This theme is for example also reflected in the half-human, half-bird title figure of Servais' 1979 film '' Harpya''.


Production

''Siren'' was made short after Belgium's Ministry of Culture had been split into two, one each for the Flemish and French Communities. The Flemish Ministry of Culture approached Servais, who was an established figure in Belgian animation and a teacher at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in
Ghent Ghent ( ; ; historically known as ''Gaunt'' in English) is a City status in Belgium, city and a Municipalities of Belgium, municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the Provinces of Belgium, province ...
, with the prospect of making what became ''Siren''. The film was written and directed by Servais and produced through Absolon Films with backing from the Flemish Community. The set designs for ''Siren'' were created by Norbert Desyn. Servais did almost all the animation work himself. Lucien Goethals, a regular collaborator of Servais, composed the musical score. The film has a running time of 9 minutes and 30 seconds.


Reception

''Siren'' premiered in 1968 and was shown at film festival in Europe, Asia, North America and Australia, where it received critical acclaim. Servais travelled to Iran for the film's screening at the 1969 Tehran International Film Festival and met the Shahbanu
Farah Pahlavi Farah Pahlavi (; []; born 14 October 1938) is the former Queen and last Empress () of Pahlavi Iran and is the third wife and widow of the last List of monarchs of Iran, Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. She was born into a prosperous Ira ...
. ''Siren'' received the following festival awards: * 1968: Silver Pelican at the Mamaia International Animation Film Festival * 1969: Grand Prize for Animation Film at the Tehran International Film Festival * 1969: Film Critics' Prize at the Tehran International Film Festival * 1969: Silver Boomerang at the
Melbourne International Film Festival The Melbourne International Film Festival (MIFF) is an annual film festival held over three weeks in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. It was founded in 1952 and is one of the oldest film festivals in the world following the founding of the Venic ...
* 1969: Richard Declerck Award, Grand Prix at the Belgian National Film Festival * 1969: Best Colour Film at the Belgian National Film Festival * 1970: Silver Hugo, First Prize for Animation Film at the
Chicago International Film Festival The Chicago International Film Festival is an annual film festival held every fall. Founded in 1964 by Michael Kutza, it is the longest-running competitive film festival in North America. Its logo is a stark, black and white close up of the comp ...
* 1970: First Prize at the Philadelphia International Film Festival


See also

* Mermaids in popular culture *
Siren (mythology) In Greek mythology, sirens () are female humanlike beings with alluring voices; they appear in a scene in the ''Odyssey'' in which Odysseus saves his crew's lives. Roman poets place them on some small islands called Sirenum scopuli. In some la ...


References


Citations


Sources

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Further reading

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External links

*{{IMDb title, id=0262005, title=Siren
Presentation
at the Raoul Servais Foundation's website 1968 films Belgian animated short films Films directed by Raoul Servais Animated films without speech Films about mermaids 1968 animated short films