Moonbird

1959 AnimationFamily 10 minutes Directed by John Hubley

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About Moonbird

After dark, two small boys climb out of the bedroom window with a plan to catch a bird they call the moonbird and bring it home. They set a trap. The bird follows them, hops in and out of the trap, and stays just ahead of them.

Cast & crew

More about Moonbird

John Hubley directed. Faith Hubley produced it with him. The voices are their sons, Mark Hubley and Ray Hubley, called Hampy. The parents taped the boys in the dark, before sleep, inventing the adventure, then had the pictures drawn to the tape. Robert Cannon and Ed Smith animated. Released 29 January 1959.

Themes

  • A night escape from the bedroom
  • A bird that will not stay in the trap
  • A story the children told before the drawings
  • moonbird
  • Mark Hubley
  • Hampy Hubley
  • John Hubley
  • night
  • animation

Technique

The picture was drawn after the tape. Cannon and Smith animated to speech that had not been written as a script.

Music

There is no composed score on the credit list. The track is Mark and Hampy Hubley talking, recorded in their room before they slept.

Preservation

The Academy Film Archive preserved the short in 2003. Copyright has lapsed in the United States.

Notes

  • The San Francisco Film Festival program credits the production company as Storyboard-Harrison and lists Faith Hubley, then billed as Elliott, as a director with John.
  • An on-screen credit line reads that two boys have an adventure in the middle of the night.
  • It was the first independent short to win the Academy Award for cartoon.
  • The Academy Film Archive preserved it in 2003. The film is in the public domain.

Awards

  • Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoons), 32nd Academy Awards (1960)

Scenes

  • The boys climb out the bedroom window.
  • The moonbird jumps in and out of the trap they set for it.

Also available

  • Wikimedia Commons (Moonbird (1959).webm)