Watching Soyuzmultfilm's output has given me great pleasure for nearly a decade now and it is a shame that a lot of their output is worthy of more credit than it gets. It is very rare to find a studio where what has been seen of theirs, which is a vast majority in my case, has never been less than decent. With their best work being as good as Russian animation gets. That's refreshing when one sees at least one misfire with most studios and some studios that don't have a single good effort and their best being average at least.
Aleksandra Snechko-Blotskaya's 'A Dragon' is not one of Soyuzmultfilm's best known, but it is wonderful and deserving of more popularity. Snechko-Blotskaya's work as director and animator was consistently of exceptionally high quality, whether in fairy/folk tales or the five Greek myth adaptations she did late in her career, and one of her darkest and moodiest 'A Dragon' is no exception whatsoever.
Everything is wonderfully done. Absolutely loved the animation, which did make me pine for the return of traditional animation. As great as the rich dark colours and distinctive (and more stylised than usual) character designs are it's those pretty incredible-looking backgrounds and landscapes that are especially good here, though noticeably with a darker colour pallette than most of Soyuzmultfilm's output. And that is the case of a lot of their work this decade.
The music score is haunting and has the right amount of brooding mystery. The writing is sensitive and doesn't try to either over-complicate or dumb down, so target audience is never in question, while the story fills the short length well without over-stretching or cramming too much in. It is very rich in mood in what is one of Snechko-Blotskaya's darkest works, without getting too dark, and a fantastic job is done immersing the viewer into this very mystical and haunting world that does unsettle.
Characters are similarly well realised and faithfully written and voiced very plenty of enthusiasm without being theatrical.
Absolutely wonderful all in all. 10/10.
