Cirrus@Austlit

A short animated film developed from the 1996 novel The Way of the Birds: A Child and a Curlew Travel Across the World.

Parent production company Every Cloud Productions offers the following synopsis of the film:

'The Ways Of The Birds [sic] is the story of a little girl who thinks she is a bird. She never speaks to humans, but dances and twitters and talks with the willy wagtails, ravens, magpies and white-plumed honeyeaters that visit her garden. And then one day she finds a dying Eastern Curlew in the backyard and her spirit is transported to the Siberian plains where these great wading birds breed and hatch. She turns into a curlew herself and eventually goes with them on their journey across the world.

'When finally her spirit returns home, she wakes from her dreams and buries the curlew with the help of her mother and brother. The neighbour's kids who until then have thought her crazy, decide to join in and they work to create a haven which will provide a vital stopover for the migratory birds. Their labours bear fruit: One day an Eastern Curlew lands in the little swamp that they have created on the edge of their suburb, rests and feeds to regain strength for the rest of its journey.

And the little girl finds the words to speak to her mother for the first time.'

Source: Every Cloud Productions (http://www.everycloudproductions.com.au/about-us/fiona-eagger/twenty-20/the-way-of-the-birds/p/31). (Sighted: 18/10/2012)