The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics

Yes: Amazing coincidence (and shades of the Blair Witch coincidence) Mr. Richard Wiley Jerome and I, Mr. Raymond Kenneth Petry, both of Sacramento CA USA at that time in Arden Junior High School, did Norton Juster's, The Dot And The Line, on his family's home movie camera - we called it, Planar-Vision - the camera had a single-frame feature, and with their tripod looking down on our display board, we pinned variously cloth cuttings of the Dot, velvet hemming for the Line (except when he looked thin and drawn and on-edge, we drew him, on-the-edge) and Squiggle was mohair yarn ... we shot the whole story. For voice we added his little sister, Jeanie, and for hours we re-recorded over our giggles and laughter, till we had it just right and well-timed: then we single-shot each scene straight-through by timings.

In 1965-69, we went to Rio Americano High School, and showed our mathematics class, eventually: We were both scholars: Rich went on to be Salutatorian for Rio Americano in 1969, and matriculated at Stanford, and I took 1st Place in the Central Valleys Math Quiz (against the MAA perfect-top-scorer) in 1969, and matriculated at UCSD, for my BA in mathematics.

The Dot and The Line is a most memorable story done in fun: We're delighted that Hollywood thought enough of it, too.

/rkp

We don't always get the same narration so I rarely mention it, but here Robert Morley provides a lovely tone to his alliterative narration depicting this most unlikely of love stories. The straight line, dependable and steady, loves the dot. The dot, suitably dotty, fancies the innovative and lively squiggle. This neglect attracts the attention of his fellow lines, but try as they might to make him see sense, he remains wistfully obsessed. Now he just spends him time imagining himself as a much more active and noble creation, but in the end - a line, is a line, is a line... This self deception is no good. Maybe he might as well just admit defeat? He will never be squiggle. Maybe he can be an angle, though? A series of the things? Might dot like this new talent? Well he'd best practice til he can make an infinite number of shapes and even curves. This is all empty though - he needs dot to join in. Can he dazzle her? This is cheerily scored with the subject matter providing Chuck Jones with a veritable myriad of shapes, colours and sizes and though it's maybe a bit repetitive it's still quite a good fun watch and personally, had I'd be line or squiggle I'd have told the fickle dot to get lost!

This opens with Cupid shooting at Dot and missing. Dot is not having Line who is way too straight. Dot is much more interested in having fun with Squiggle. The Line works to prove his worthiness. The big name here is legendary animator Chuck Jones who is the co-director. The narrator is noted actor Robert Morley. I think I remember seeing this some time in my childhood. It has the experimental style of the 60's. It's fun. I do have an idea for an extra scene. Line and Squiggle can have a shape-off. Like bodybuilders, they could pose into various shapes to entice Dot. That would be a great finale.

No longer working at Warner Bros., Chuck Jones made this mystifying short about a drab delineation in love with a dot. He can't catch her attention until he realizes that he can make angles and all sorts of shapes.

Now that I've seen "The Dot and the Line: A Romance in Lower Mathematics", I would say that it's the sort of movie which I wish that I had seen in math classes. Directed by Jones, it's certainly a clever one. However, I wouldn't call it the greatest cartoon. All the stuff about the scruffy squiggle sounds a little bit like they were chastising young people for being independent; ironically, the whole cartoon seems kind of psychedelic! So, it may not be Chuck's masterpiece - in my view, "What's Opera, Doc?" easily gets that distinction - but still worth seeing. Narrator Robert Morley also starred in "The African Queen" and "Theater of Blood".

I truly have to admire the works of Chuck Jones. He made a name for himself directing Bugs Bunny shorts for Warner Brothers starting in the 1940's (although he directed many other animated shorts during that era,including animated training films for the U.S. government,some of which featured scripts written by Theodore S.Geisel,later to be known & loved by generations as Dr.Suess),moving on to creating The Road Runner in the 1950's,and moving on even further to working on directing animated programs for television in the 1960's,to animated feature fare in the 1970's. Every now & again, he would surprise us with something different & left of centre. 'The Dot And The Line:A Romance In Lower Mathematics',a short he directed for M-G-M in 1965 is a shining example of this. The story (read by veteran British actor,Robert Morley)is simple:a straight line is madly in love with a dot,who only cares for an abstract squiggle line. This causes the line to re-evaluate his position on things. The concept of abstract animation is by no means a new idea, but Jones (with assistance from co-director/co-writer Maurice Noble)manage to pull it off nicely (the idea for animating abstract images actually hearkens back to silent films in the 1920's,and later augmented by classical music in the 1930's & beyond). Well worth seeking out if you're idea of animation is something that is exclusively for children.