I used to enjoy watching La Linea episodes on TVOntario when I was a child. It was a nice surprise to stumble across episode number 156 of La Linea recently (below). I love the simplicity of the cartoons and the ranting & laughing of Mr. Linea — all in all definitely material worth sharing on CartoonAndAnimation.com
According to Wikipedia:
‘La Linea (“The Line”) is an Italian animated series created by the Italian cartoonist Osvaldo Cavandoli.’
[...]
‘The cartoon features a man (known as “Mr. Linea” or, in some parts of Europe, “Balou”, as well as “Linus på linjen” (Linus on the Line) in Sweden, “Badum badum” in Slovenia, “Menő Manó” (Walking Pixie) in Hungary, “Mar Kav” (Mister Line) in Israel, “Bajram” in Albania, “Streken” in Norway, “Stregen” in Denmark, “Línan” in Iceland, “Baljum Baljum” (Баљум Баљум) in the Republic of Macedonia, “Bay Meraklı” (Mr. Curious) in Turkey, “Bajum Badum” in Serbia and “Lineman” in the U.S.) drawn as a single outline around his silhouette, walking on an infinite line of which he is a part. The character encounters obstacles and often turns to the cartoonist to draw him a solution, with various degrees of success. One recurring obstacle was an abrupt end of line. The character would often almost fall off the edge into oblivion and get angry with the cartoonist and complain about it. He was voiced by Carlo Bonomi in a version of Milanese dialect resembling gibberish as much as possible, giving the cartoon the possibility to be easily exported without dubbing.’1
There is a short article on Wikipedia on Osvaldo Cavandoli (January 1, 1920 – March 3, 2007) for those interested in learning more about the cartoonist. A 3 DVD collection of La Linea episodes is available from Amazon.com
References
- La Linea (TV series) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Linea_%28TV_series%29 Accessed 30/09/09.
