The director of 'Man in the Frame' (Russian title: 'Chelovek v ramke'), Fyodor Khitruk (in Russian: Фёдор Саве́льевич Хитру́к), I read in some disbelief, is a distinguished animator who has won many awards in his native Russia.
Considering that the short animated film, which dares to criticise wryly the ingratiating, square (in every sense) bureaucrats who literally cannot and will not think outside the box, was made in 1966 in Soviet Russia, the acclaim rather puzzled me. It seems pretty obvious that Khitruk derides the limiting, Procrustean frame of mind (at some point, the prototypic bureaucrat trims a diamond-shaped kite into a square that fits the frame - clearly, difference and deviation from the norm is not tolerated) of the rigid regime, which was supported by an army of bureaucrats just like the anonymous man in the frame.
Incidentally, Fyodor Khitruk has just celebrated his 93rd birthday: he was born on the 1st of May 1917.
Sources: Wikipedia (the entry there being partly copied verbatim from a similar article found at Russia Info Centre); the presentation of 'The Spirit of Genius', Otto Alder's documentary on Khitruk screened at the 5th Tehran International Animation Festival (on that webpage, the title appears as 'The Sprite of Genius').
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