Symphonies

A couple of days ago, laying the groundwork for an upcoming trip with Cleo, I stopped by MICA's video library and asked for some recommendations for DVDs that might appeal to a certain 3-and-a-half-year-old. I already had my sights set on Snow White, since Cleo's given the thumbs-up to princesses,in general, and to Disney, via Dumbo. But I was happily surprised to hear the girl working the desk recommend Disney's Silly Symphonies, a compilation of shorts, primarily, from the 1930s, that marry musical passages to animation. "I loved them when I was a kid," she told me. And do you remember anything of them, today? Sure, she said - and told me about one episode in which the instruments in a symphony orchestra are given personalities, and in which a member of the brass can then falls in love, problematically, with a stringed instrument. Romeo and Juliet for trombones and cellos! I took that one home, too.

We haven't watched Silly Symphonies yet, but Cleo did ask for a more or less immediate screening of Snow White. Given that it's over an hour long, and that parts of it - evil queen; plotted murder; poisoned apple - are pretty intense, we spent some time chatting about it on the way home from school, and then watched it in parts. On the whole, I'd say it went well: after reaching the end of the movie, Cleo spent a block of time yesterday asking us to retell the story, before expressing a desire this morning to watch the beginning once more. She's digesting it; making it hers. And I can see why such a process appeals, for there are some stretches that are truly unsettling. Indeed, Roy Disney recalls, in the DVD's liner notes, watching the film as a boy and being terrified by the claw-like branches that cling to Snow White's skirts as she flees into the forest. Sure enough, that seems to have been the scene that affected Cleo the most. This morning, when I sat down next to her after making her warm milk, Snow White was just about to repeat her flight through the woods - and Cleo's body was turned at an awkward 60-degree angle away from the screen. "If you were not here," she told me, "I would close my eyes."

But of course once you've seen a scary stretch of film once, it often ceases to be as scary, the second time. Cleo now knew that the apparently monstrous eyes in the forest belonged to benign deer and rabbits; she had gathered, too, that the snarling crocodiles were merely the figments of a frightened Snow White's imagination. And I, too, initially struck by the vibrant quality of the animation in Disney's first feature length film (it came out in 1937), could now pay attention to other elements, as well - such as the music (which comprised the first commercially issued film soundtrack). Thus, as Snow White turned and shrieked and fell, I listened to the crescendo of strings and to the rapid rhythm that intensified the disorienting aspect of the scene.

And you know what? Once you start to listen, you can hear symphonic aspects in a number of surprising places. Yesterday afternoon, Cleo and I went to Port Discovery, a children's activity center (excuse me - children's 'museum') that we've visited repeatedly over the last three years. She's always found something to keep her busy there, but yesterday was an absolute delight, as she threw herself into each option at hand - gathering groceries in a mock store; washing windows; drawing sea monsters - with simple enthusiasm. I followed along, playing by her rules on the mock soccer field and squirting water pistols alongside her - and as I did, it occurred to me that our 3 hours there were something like a symphony. Multiple parts, conducted towards a common end of fun and exploration.

In the end, then, the only little cottage we found was a miniaturized Trojan Horse, in which kids could hide. But we did learn, all over again, the appeal of separate lines that work together towards the creation of something substantial, and varied. Tuba and violin, father and daughter, girl and princess: arbitrary divisions that fade and dissolve in the light of art.