The Lost Boy
When watching “The Lost Thing”, immediately my attention was drawn to the mysterious creature. Most people’s focus during the duration of the movie was on the thing whether it was trying to figure out what it was, where it came from, or how it was going to get back there. However, now reflecting on its journey throughout the film, I cannot help but dedicate my thoughts, not to it, but its only companion.
The little boy was having a seemingly average day on the beach when he happened upon the creature; the two spent the entirety of the day playing games together and their friendship blossomed. I found myself asking, why would a little boy befriend such a strange, lost thing? Did he have nothing else to do? Did he not have other friends to play with? I doubt his parents even questioned his absence. Sadly, I imagine this boy bonded with the lost thing so naturally because the boy himself was alone. The film depicted the world he lived in as extremely humdrum and grey; there was no color or emotion. When shown the beach, I didn’t see any other children playing or laughing. There was no happiness from anyone at a place where I commonly associate with positive experiences and memories. I believe the lost thing triggered the boys normally unstimulated curiosity and provided a short-term distraction from the melancholy life he lived.
The ending to the short film was what left me thinking of the boy. The viewer sees the boy on a train looking out a window and spots yet another mysterious lost thing. Now, however, it does not spark his interest. The narrator states how the boy has seen fewer and fewer lost things; this is not because there are less of them but because his sensitivity to them has gone away. He loses his inquisitiveness and innocence as he grows up and enters the cyclical day of an adult in this society. Most likely he will learn to walk in sync with the others on their way to and from work, bearing the same emotionless expression permanently painted on his face. When the Lost Thing was eventually helped home, I was hopeful the boy would begin to guide other lost creatures to their rightful place, acting as a Davy Jones sort of character who assisted lost souls to the other side. I was disappointed to find out that at the conclusion of the film that the boy was too consumed with acting normal to care about lost things. Looking back on the movie, I believe the director was trying to present his audience with a distraction, the Lost Thing, in hope that they realize how mundane their own lives are. The message was to get the viewers to discover the joy and uniqueness in their own lives.