franceslievens | Blog Week: Pim & Pom's Big Adventure

Like a lot of Flemish children born in the seventies, I grew up on a steady dose of drawings by Fiep Westendorp. I quickly learned her name, written together with that of one of my favourite writers on the cover of several books my sister and I had at home. The combo of Annie M. G. Schmidt and Fiep Westendorp meant hours of fun. It took me several years before I knew Fiep was a woman – one so desperate to earn her living with her drawings, that she had decided not to start a family, so she would have the time and resources to make a name for herself.
Even though we all came to know her as the illustrator of Annie M. G. Schmidt's work, she also worked for other writers. She created the characters Pim & Pom for writer Mies Bouhuys. Pim and Pom are two adorable cats, living in the city with the lady. They both have a distinctive character, with Pim being the outgoing, adventurous cat, who doesn't always see the danger he's in, and Pom being a bit more reserved. Pom can read, which is really something for a cat.
As a great fan fiction writer, director Gioia Smid has taken these well established characters and put them them in a new, big adventure. In "Pim & Pom: Het Grote Avontuur", the horrible nieces of the lady are moving house. Because they will miss Pim and Pom, they decide they'll just kidnap the cats and claim them for themselves. Of course Pim and Pom don't like this one bit and run away – commencing a big adventure in search of the lady and their home.

In the course of their adventure they have their loyalty to the lady and their friendship tested. I won't go into detail, but these bits had my five year old daughter moved to tears. Over the course of the film she had fallen in love with these strange cats and the almost childlike drawings by the late Fiep Westendorp. The illustrator's ability to convey a complete story in very stylised drawings, void of all detail, is cunning. The thousands of drawings she left behind helped the team to create an environment that wasn't simply drawn in the spirit of Fiep Westendorp, but indeed a copy of the work of Fiep Westendorp*. Almost every bit of imagery came from the database of Fiep Westendorp drawings.
Gioia Smid made this film as a homage to Fiep, but she also made her very own film. She was able to let drawings we all know and love, come to life. By adding sound, songs, and movement, she prickled the senses of a whole new audience for the work of Fiep Westendorp.

Eta: There's an English spoken version of the film as well. Here's the trailer for that one (the same as above, but in English, well duh).

* Source: "De schat van Fiep Westendorp" in Agenda Magazine