Don Hertzveldt’s animated film, It’s Such a Beautiful Day, uses simple line drawings, stream of consciousness narration, and inventive cinematography as brushstrokes to build the story of Bill, a man with a neurological disorder.
In Hertzveldt’s narration, the mundane and the fantastical are woven together: “Bill sat down and put on a big sweater, but it only made him sleepy”. “The guy next to him at the bus stop had the head of a cow, but Bill pretended not to notice.” As reality slips and slides around him, Bill does his best to make his world make sense.
Bill recalls his childhood, his happy and his strange memories. Has his condition distorted his recollection? He attends medical appointments. His ex-girlfriend, and his mother, take care of him, but he is isolated from the people around him. He starts to notice the beauty of small details that he hadn’t seen before.
Bill’s simply drawn, animated world contrasts with the stylised cinematography. We see bare branches against a stunning skyscape, a volcanic wasteland, waves crashing on a beach. Hertzfeldt captured some of the footage using multiple exposures, imparting a dreamlike weirdness. Sometimes images are shown in a split screen with fuzzy edges. The colours are vibrant and distorted. The whole film was shot on a 35 mm camera that was built in the 1940s.
It’s Such a Beautiful Day stands out as a meditation on humanity. It’s a compassionate exploration of suffering, beauty, and fragile reality. It’s definitely worth seeing on the big screen, if you get a chance.
Hertzfeldt’s animated short film, ME, completes the double bill, shown as part of the Manipulate Festival. It’s wordless and surreal, shaped by a stunning soundtrack where rhythmic drumming is interspersed with classical ecstasy.
The characters are, once again, rendered as line drawings. A man walks to work, briefcase in hand, through battle-torn streets. In a family home, eruptions of anger sow further division between people. Accompanied by Michael William Balfe’s stunning operatic aria I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls, the main character’s body disintegrates as his brain is assimilated into a wired infrastructure. Flowers grow from corpses in the streets. There is a lot of rain. This fantastical dystopia is richly imaginative.
It’s Such a Beautiful Day and ME were shown on 8th February 2026 at the Filmhouse in Edinburgh. https://www.filmhouse.org.uk/home/
Reviewer: Wendy McEwan
Reviewed: 8th February 2026
North West End UK Rating: