Joel Allen Schroeder loves Calvin & Hobbes. That much is apparent from the filmmaker's debut feature, Dear Mr. Watterson. Schroeder is not alone in his adoration. As the film makes clear, Bill Watterson's daily comic strip about a six-year-old boy and his plush tiger was (and is) beloved by millions. The strip's craft and imagination are similarly revered by other comic artists. Moreover, Calvin & Hobbes is the rare work to conclude on a high note: after a 10-year run, Watterson brought the massively successful strip to a close in 1995. This has contributed to the comic's reputation, as have the artist's reclusiveness and his refusal to license his characters.
Dear Mr. Watterson is foremost a love letter to Calvin & Hobbes. The film is densely packed with warm-hearted interviews, in which Schroeder allows comic artists, executives, writers, historians, and everyday people to gush over Watterson's work. Fortunately, Schroeder doesn't set off on a quixotic mission to track down the creator; the film's focus is on the strip itself. The director does, however, make a detour to the archives where the original Calvin & Hobbes drawings are stored, and to Watterson's hometown of Chagrin Falls, Ohio, where the landscape influenced the strip's look.
After a while, the film's fawning approach becomes somewhat repetitious and superficial, but there are a few surprises, such as the comparisons illustrating the influence of Calvin & Hobbes on subsequent strips. Cartoonists such as Berkeley Breathed bluntly offer their perspectives on the business of comics, and Pearls Before Swine's Stephan Pastis goes on an incisive rant that is one of the film's highlights. Although all the gooey remembrances elicit a smile, Schroeder film's is at its best when it is gets a little muddy about matters of art and commerce.
Dr. Mr. Watterson screens nightly at 7:30 p.m. on March 7–9 at Webster University’s Winifred Moore Auditorium. Admission is $6 (cash only).
