Changes
1989 · 18m · Canada
Directed by Moira Simpson
Genres: animation, documentary, family
Animated sequences explain puberty's physical and emotional changes and encourage pride in growing bodies.
Picked by Margot
The scouts
A public-health PSA dressed up in animation—the most consensus-friendly premise imaginable, which is exactly why the 1989 NFB execution matters: it refuses shame, refuses cuteness, refuses to flinch, and that refusal is genuinely subversive for a film about bodies.
Simpson's formal command of the animated form—the restraint in design, the rhythmic editing, the tonal consistency across sequences—situates this squarely in the NFB's pedagogical lineage while elevating what could be rote into something formally considered and genuinely moving.
The decision to animate rather than live-action is obvious; what makes it work is the specific texture Simpson chose—a kind of tender, unsentimental line work that treats adolescent bodies with dignity instead of cute metaphor, doing more emotional work with less ornament than a live-action equivalent ever could.