Katy Caterpillar (1984)

A childhood favourite of mine. I've now had a chance to reflect on it as an adult and can see that the film has many wonderful messages for children on discovering their identity, to explore, try new things, handle the criticism/prejudice/conceit of others, the perils of a life consisting purely of work and no pleasure, the pitfalls of believing that the purchase of possessions will make you happy, the over-hyped status of city-life (maybe the grass on the other side isn't as green as you thought it was once you get there).

As a cartoon, I still think it's elegantly drawn, Katy is chubby, sweet, adorable and perfectly voiced.

The songs are cheerful and bouncy, with Katy's "Someday" song standing out by a mile, a very sweet, emotional song, sung with a lot of conviction, it always gets me a little teary-eyed.

Some of the other songs seem to suffer a little due to the English pronunciation being a little off. I was getting the impression that some songs were sung by the Spanish voice-cast singing English words but pronouncing them like Spanish words.

I guess that's why as a child I couldn't really catch the meaning of some of the other songs. That's a minor shame, as I now realise that the lyrics of these other songs also conveyed strong messages too.

It might be a worthwhile endeavour for someone to contribute English subtitles for this film one day. If I can spare some time one day, I might give it a try.

On the whole though, still a terrific film, and one I hope to show my children.