Dear Mr. Watterson

2013 "An Exploration of Calvin & Hobbes"
6.4| 1h29m| NR| en| More Info
Released: 15 November 2013 Released
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Official Website: http://www.dearmrwatterson.com/
Synopsis

20 years after Calvin and Hobbes stopped appearing in daily newspapers, filmmaker Joel Allen Schroeder has set out to explore the reasons behind the comic strip's loyal and devoted following.

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Reviews

RyothChatty ridiculous rating
Beystiman It's fun, it's light, [but] it has a hard time when its tries to get heavy.
Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.
Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful
Mr-Fusion There are guys who have been drawing comic strips for twenty, thirty years, and here's Bill Watterson with his decade-run on Calvin and Hobbes, redefining the artform before walking off the stage. It was essentially a mic drop and then a fade into obscurity. You can probably tell how deeply my love runs for his work, and I'll try not to belabor that point. But this movie is only so happy to do just that, pulling artists from all levels of comic strip fame to pay respect to that legacy that the reclusive Watterson left in his wake. It's more than just communal appreciation and rightly points out just what he did to raise the bar and preserve the strip's integrity. And that word is the name of the game; because while Calvin and Hobbes continues to attract and influence, it's also left to stand on its own. This is a quality documentary, and it evokes genuine emotions. It's as much a love letter as it is an artistic statement.7/10
donaldricco I love, love, love the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes! This movie, I just liked. It's much too long for the little "new" material/information it provides. However, I really liked the computer graphics that are in it, and it revived the love of C&H in my cellular structure! So much so, that after this, I'm gathering up all of my book collections, and reading them with my 9 year old girl! :-) Then, I'm off to go play an inning? round? quarter?, of Calvin Ball!! "... let's go exploring!"
trainspotting This new trend in documentaries is very annoying.Here is the formula about the person making the doc. They are not famous, they really liked or geeked out over something and now want to talk to like minded people and gush over the past and how something that was very good like "Calvin and Hobbes" made them feel and you really don't find out anything about the person or people involved in the thing they love. It is about a bunch of nobody fan boys.Also refer to "Done the Impossible" for a another piece of garbage in this genre.Mr. Watterson created a great comic strip years ago and is a very private person from what I have read. I would have liked to know more about him and less about the people who liked his comic strip.
BlackJack_B Calvin and Hobbes is probably my favorite comic strip. Created by Bill Watterson, C&H was about a boy and his stuffed tiger who "came to life" whenever they were alone. His best friend, his rival, his voice of reason, etc. Hobbes always was there for Calvin. As well, Calvin has a vivid imagination with his alter egos Spaceman Spiff and Stupendous Man getting him out of the frying pan and into the fryer at school. His abuse of Susie Derkins and his parents was always fun, as well as his battles against Rosalyn the babysitter. It, like Peanuts, was a comic that anybody could enjoy.Bill Watterson is a man I admire because his only reason for cartooning was for his love of the art. He refused to prostitute his creation for huge money and lamented the smaller spaces a newspaper would provide for his creations. After several breaks, he ended his comic strip on January 1, 1996 and retreated to private life. In a day when Justin Bieber claims he will "retire" but won't because his huge ego and opportunities will be too great, Watterson has stayed true to his word.Dear Mr. Watterson is a Kickstarter type documentary directed by Joel Allen Schroeder, a big fan of Calvin and Hobbes who visits Chagrin Falls, Ohio to learn more about the man's early life and his work before hitting it big. He visits a library to see his early work and find what his influences are. He talks to some of his friends in L.A. who are big fans of the comic to this day.It's the segments with other cartoonists that are of interest. Many of them are fans of Watterson but one, Berkeley Breathed, seems to be a tiny bit bitter about being seen as a sell-out as Charles Schulz, Jim Davis and Scott Adams are for marketing their creations to the max.Some of the documentary is rather pointless babble about the true meaning of Calvin and Hobbes but there is some good insight on what made the man tick and how he operated. I felt it could have been 15 minutes shorter, though. Respectfully, Schroeder does not go looking for Mr. Watterson and honors his want of privacy.All in all, not bad. I really can't see the subject being done better and not intruding on Bill Watterson's privacy. I'm grateful he was able to give the masses a delightful comic that never gets old or tiresome and didn't overstay its welcome, unlike Justin Bieber and any other auto-tuned "singing sensation".