The Pied Piper of Hamelin (1980) producers: Cosgrove Hall Productions Ltd animation: stop-motion animation run time: 30mins In 1376, the city of Hamelin is freed from a plague of hungry rats by a mysterious Piper who plays a tune and leads the vermin on a mery dance out of town and straight in to the river. But the greedy city Governers refuse to pay their agreed fee, so the Piper wreaks a terible revenge. He plays his pipe once more, only this time he leads all the children of Hamelin away to a magical mountain portal, from which they never return... "The Pied Piper" is a classic tale, often told, but never so well as in this Cosgrove Hall film. The production takes its cue from Robert Browning's poem of the same name, written in 1888, and it's a stirring adaptation. The thronging streets of Hamelin play host to a wave of gnashing, thrashing vermin who are led away by an elfin Piper. This stranger takes his cue from "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang"'s Childcatcher. He moves with malevolent grace, twisting his fingers and pointing his toes and unsettling all with his strange and beautiful manner. In the hands of animators Barry Purves and Marj Graham, each of the myriad puppets is imbued with its own unique character. This is fabulous stuff, and it's narrated with real gusto by Robert Hardy. As the children are led away to Koppelberg Hill, the music swells and kaleidoscope colours dance overhead before they disappear, leaving just one lame boy behind in a lonely spotlight. The quietest scene is the best of all. The Piper, having fulfilled his pledge to rid the city of its scourge, settles down to rest by the riverbank. And there, as he sits swaddled in his warm cloak, we watch him rest through to morning. The sky behind him fades to lushious purple and welcomes in the night. Now he is silhouetted against the stars. As the soft violet of dawn spreads across the sky, a line of geese pass overhead and the Piper wakes and stretches. We are observing melancholic magic here. It is the calm before the storm that is the Piper's revenge. "The Pied Piper" is surely one of Cosgrove Hall's finest achievements. For students it's an animation masterclass, and they like everyone else will tell you it's also a haunting, beautiful film that lingers long in the memory....Founded in 1976 by Brian Cosgrove and Mark Hall, Cosgrove Hall Films was part of Thames Television until 1993 (when Thames lost its weekday ITV London licence to Carlton Television). Its ownership later transferred to Anglia Television, (and, following the series of 1990s takeovers, ITV plc). Its first series was Chorlton and the Wheelies, the lead role being named after the district of Manchester where the company was based (the other characters were placed on wheels as this made the stop-frame animation easier). The show, sold worldwide by Thames, was never shown in Israel after a graphic designer mistakenly put a Star of David on the front of a talking spell-book instead of a Pentagram. The book spoke with a Germanic accent and therefore was considered offensive.One of their early employees was Bernard Sumner who went on to be an integral member of Manchester rock bands Joy Division and New Order.

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