Joann Sfar and Goats That Climb Trees

This early stage is my favorite part of film making. Everything is a possibility - it's so invigorating. My job is to immerse myself in ideas and images and then simply listen. It's almost like the story itself is inside me listening along with me, and sometimes it calls out "Yes!" As if it knows what it needs to come into existence, knows what it wants to be.

Here's all I know about my main character at this point. She's a girl, maybe a navajo, and a shepherdess, she may or may not have a special relationship with water, and there's a tree somehow involved.

Recently I was reading "The Rabbi's Cat" by Joann Sfar, one of my favorite French cartoonists (more on French cartoonists later), when I encountered these panels. (For the record, Sfar's book is heartfelt, humorous, and thought-provoking. His scratchy drawings are dripping in rich character and a true sense of "place-ness," definitely worth the read.)






I saw these and was immediately hooked. A little research turned up these:



I can't believe I haven't seen this on film before! I need to find a way to include this...