Paddle to the Sea (Released by Janus Films, in association with the Criterion Collection)

Growing up as a young boy in Michigan in 1960s, spending time on Lake Saint Clair/Lake Erie fishing for pike, muskee and perch with my father, watching the cargo freighters and hearing Indian stories fueled my love of nature and my curiosity about the world. It was the start of my wanderlust. "Paddle to the Sea" reminded me of that innocent time.

The story starts on a cold winter day, besides the warmth of a fireplace, a young Canadian boy is carving a wooden model of an Indian in a canoe out of a cedar log. He sets his toy boat free to travel through the Great Lakes-St Lawrence Seaway to the Atlantic ocean. We become part of that journey.

This is a classic short film I remember seeing in elementary school in the late 1970s. It presents the simple adventure story of a carved indian raft's journey to the sea with subtle (mostly) moral and environmental overtones. Kids will thoroughly enjoy this, especially if they're remotely into the outdoors.

My caveat is that the actual disc release is completely unexceptional. Image quality: claimed to be a newly restored high-definition master is sorely lacking. It exhibits poor image contrast and sharpness, with lots of inconsistent film grain and even some hairs occasionally clogging the frame. In 2008, correcting those sorts of technical flaws is something you can now easily do with a home computer. So I expected a lot more from the Criterion Collection.

Extras: none. I'd love to know a tiny bit more about the film and the filmmakers but there's nothing here other than the short and chapter stops. Love this movie, just wish it had gotten the first class treatment it deserves.

This little film is just really fun to watch. I love the idea behind it, and teachers using it in the classroom will want to either read the book to their students first, or explain the premise, as the narration in the film is quite subtle regarding the boy's illness and why he himself cannot 'paddle to the sea.' Very young kids will appreciate all the animals that interact with the canoe, and the film presents the opportunity to segue into science or history or geography lessons.

Having first met Paddle to the Sea in print as a child, and having been fascinated by it, I felt this was a true interpretation and faithful to the book. I would introduce the child first to the book and then to the DVD.

This is the kind of film that works its way into your subconscious. A boy carves a small wooden canoe with one wooden passenger...an all-watchful Native American...and sends the small craft into a frozen lake so that it can journey thousands of miles to the ocean. To keep the canoe afloat, the boy pours a bar of lead into the bottom of the canoe. "I am Paddle to the Sea" the boat tells us. The film tracks its journey past frogs, deer, and snakes, past ice and storm, even past the rushing currents of Niagara Falls. A few individuals fish it out of the water but on seeing the instructions (carved on the bottom of the boat) they wisely return the craft back into the lake or stream from whence it came. Thus, the canoe returns to its mysterious source. This is a fine contemplative film that makes us meditate on our own personal journeys, our own attachments, and our own connection to the living world (After all, the canoe started out as part of a tree). In a 21st century world where too many children's films are violent or meaningless, this is a perfect gift for youngsters five and upwards.