Psyche and Eros

Psyche was a Princess of such beauty and sweetness that the Goddess Aphrodite became jealous of her. She instructed her son Eros to destroy the mortal. But, to her fury, the God of Love fell in love himself.

A straight telling of this classic tale that sees Psyche in the underworld with her lover and in a way it is a good thing that it does just what the title suggests. In doing this it marks itself out as being good for schools because the material is fairly good and doesn't really have much room for individual flair in the short or characters as the lack of dialogue makes it all about the events in the story rather than feelings etc.

It is also rather dated. Not just because the film is about thirteen years old but also because it is closely based on the drawings of Karl Weschke, which pitches it with the right sort of look for the period but perhaps is too close and lacks a feeling of originality. De Vere directs well with the source in mind but the downside of this is that it is rather flat and "matter of fact" in style. An OK telling of the story but it is probably best used to liven up a classics lesson in school rather than viewed as a film in its own right.