It's Such a Beautiful Day
Director: Don Hertzfeldt
Year Released: 2012
Rating: 3.5
Idiosyncratic animator Hertzfeldt brings together a trio of short films about a hapless everyman named Bill and his struggles with physical and mental deterioration as well as the tediousness and strangeness of everyday existence. Even though Hertzfeldt's principal figures in this are simply drawn (stick figures!), he's an incredibly distinctive voice (his technique has been pinched, to say the least, by companies for advertisements) and there are many moments of truth and poetry along with his trademark taste for absurd, often dark humor. Anyone that's ever experienced strong depression will most likely find something in this to empathize with: even as Bill's disintegrating in every way imaginable, he finds a glimmer of magic somewhere within himself.
