Description:

A child writes a letter to a scientist who is traveling abroad. The letter follows him all over the world. Based on the poem by Samuil Marshak.

A very influential and internationally-acclaimed film at the time. The black and white silent version was released in 1929, and was immediately hailed by critics as a breakthrough signifying animation's coming-of-age as an art form. There was also a colour version of the film - a positive, coloured by hand. A year after its initial 1929 release, it was given a soundtrack and became the first Soviet animated film with sound (the director of this version was N. Timofeyev). This version was in black and white again (as colour was impossible with sound at the time), and was about 10 minutes longer, mostly due to a specially-made introduction. It was again extremely well-received and popular. This version traveled abroad, where it was well-liked everywhere it screened, and eventually the original negative was sold abroad somewhere (perhaps in the United States), and it has been lost ever since despite many attempts to find it. The sound version is now considered a lost film, as is the colour version. The original silent one is the only one that survives.

The poem was translated/adapted into English in 1990 by Richard Pevear (see some info here), with many of the place names were changed from Soviet/Russian ones to American ones.