Creo que no me equivoco si digo que casi nadie sería capaz de recordar demasiado del argumento de la película ‘Up!’, pero que quienes la vimos recordamos muy nítidamente los primeros minutos en los que, a modo casi de cortometraje paralelo al film, se narra la vida de un matrimonio en unas pocas escenas y se condensa en algunos minutos una preciosa e inolvidable historia de amor. Pues, ahora que he leído esta novela gráfica, me resulta difícil creer que quienes escribieran aquella escena no se inspirasen en este librito: como mínimo coincide que ambas historias son las postales que resumen una vida a lo largo de las décadas y están contadas desde una nostalgia dulcísima y un humor lleno de ternura. Based on the award-winning book by acclaimed British author and illustrator Raymond Briggs, this beautifully hand-drawn animated feature film tells the true story of Raymond's own parents Ethel and Ernest - two ordinary Londoners living through a period of extraordinary events and immense social change. Nevertheless, the children of his long-term partner, Liz Benjamin, provided inspiration and source material for other projects, notably The Puddleman (2004), which grew from a remark made by one of the young children on passing a puddle while the family were out walking in the countryside.

Ethel and Ernest follows the lives of Raymond Briggs' parents throughout the decades, with each section divided into 10 year chunks. The story opens when they first meet, Ethel is a ladies maid and spots Ernest on his bike; he looks up and notices her at the window, and the rest, they say, is history. Ethel leaves her job and they set up home together. But friends knew another side to Briggs – loyal and playful, an inveterate practical joker. Lord once made the mistake of confessing to a dislike of dogs in the presence of Briggs, thereby immediately committing himself to becoming the recipient of all manner of canine-related gifts on subsequent birthdays and Christmases. Like so many of his characters, Briggs’s grumpiness never quite managed to conceal an underlying warmth and kindness. In 2017 he was appointed CBE. A scene from Ethel and Ernest, the 2016 film of Raymond Briggs’s book devoted to the story of his parents. Photograph: Vertigo FilmsAs with all Briggs’s subsequent titles, the book is full of autobiographical elements and references. His own childhood home and Loch Fyne holidays appear regularly and he himself pops up in the follow-up, Father Christmas Goes on Holiday (1975). Selected items are only available for delivery via the Royal Mail 48® service and other items are available for delivery using this service for a charge.

Social differences are also explored, as Ethel’s conservative viewpoints and aspirational ambitions are contrasted with Ernest’s dyed-in-the-wool socialist beliefs throughout. As various narrative texts came his way, he realised that not all of them were of the highest quality, and took to writing himself. In 1961 he wrote and illustrated two books, Midnight Adventure and The Strange House, for the publishers Hamish Hamilton, with whom he would have a lasting working relationship. Heartwarming, humorous and bittersweet, the film follows the lives of lady's maid Ethel and milkman Ernest from their first chance meeting in 1928, through the birth of their son Raymond in 1934 to their deaths, within months of each other, in 1971. And Ethel and Ernest was already a very enjoyable movie to begin with. Sadly this photo doesn’t do the screening room justice! The characteristic that the journalist John Walsh described in a 2012 interview as a very English “strenuous curmudgeonliness” had become in later years a stereotype that Briggs embraced, exemplified by his column in the Oldie, Notes from the Sofa, collected in book form in 2015, where he would rail against sundry incomprehensible aspects of modern life.From the socially stratified 1920s to the moon landing of 1969, the film depicts, through Ethel and Ernest's eyes, the most defining moments of the 20th century - the darkness of the Great Depression, the build-up to World War II, the trials of the war years, the euphoria of VE Day and the emergence of a generation from postwar austerity to the cultural enlightenment of the 1960s. Such prejudices, still not entirely eradicated today, were commonplace at art schools of the time. Although he bemoaned his tutors’ failure to recognise a “natural illustrator”, the formal training that he received imbued in Briggs a strong sense of structure and of the importance of good draughtsmanship. These equipped him well in book illustration, although he left the Slade with what he saw as a poor sense of colour and a dislike of paint. When he eventually arrived at the film version of The Snowman, he expressed pleasure at how it so faithfully and painstakingly replicated his coloured-pencil technique, despite the massively labour-intensive approach that this necessitated. He was born in Wimbledon, south-west London, to Ethel (nee Bowyer) and Ernest Briggs. Their first meeting is beautifully described in the wordless opening sequence of the book devoted to their story. Ethel, a young parlour maid in a Belgravia house, had been innocently shaking out her duster from an upper window as Ernest passed by on his bicycle and confidently returned what he took to be a friendly wave. His final book was consciously intended to be just that. Compiled across several of his last years, Time for Lights Out (2019) is a poignant, funny and deeply honest exploration of the experience of ageing and reaching the end of life, in the form of a collage of verse, drawings and random thoughts.

Ya está Raymond Briggs haciéndome llorar. Este hombre es, para mi corazoncito, el equivalente del niño cabroncete que siempre venía a tirarme de las coletas en el colegio. Solo que con Briggs luego me quedo con la sensación de que me han hecho un favor enorme, un regalo de una delicadeza inmensa. Ethel y Ernest es sutilmente vertiginoso, como la vida, que pasa con tanta rapidez y sin que te des cuenta. Es como esos álbumes de fotos antiguas en que ves a tu padre y a tu madre tan jóvenes y guapos, y se te pone un nudo en la garganta. Ethel e Ernest è un fumetto che sa di casa in ogni pagina; si possono sentire le risate, le discussioni, i rumori dei lavori, il profumo del cibo, l’acqua che scorre, le risate di un bambino. Equally the film resonated hugely with our audience of older viewers, with the vast majority of scenes touching upon many of their real life experiences. The stunning animation of famous objects such as the Morrison Shelters or Ernest’s electric milk float also plays a large role here. Ethel and Ernest is a beautifully animated film.

The illustrations were beautiful and reminiscent of Briggs' other masterpiece, The Snowman, and the ending was very, very poignant. Liz died in 2015. He is survived by her children, Clare and Tom, and grandchildren, Connie, Tilly and Miles. El ilustrador Raymond Briggs hace un homenaje gráfico a la relación de sus padres y cuenta la historia del matrimonio desde que se conocen hasta el fallecimiento de ambos. Y, mientras tanto, sucede el siglo XX. Ethel y Ernest es un retrato personal, sí, pero también lo es de una clase social: la de los ingleses de clase trabajadora que experimentaron las penurias de dos guerras mundiales y sus consecuencias. Entre tazas de té nos narran los avances de la sociedad y, con un humor muy británico, ironizan sobre la modernidad, las revoluciones sociales y los inventos que fueron llegando a los hogares para hacer las vidas más fáciles. En esta historia también se habla mucho sobre la paternidad: sobre volcar las ilusiones en los hijos y que después sus sueños sean distintos a lo que se proyectó para ellos, sobre crecer posicionándose en contra de todo lo que se mamó. In Ethel & Ernest vertelt Raymond Briggs het verhaal van het huwelijk van zijn ouders. Vanaf hun eerste toevallige ontmoeting in 1928, toen Ethel nog een dienstmeisje en Ernest melkboer was. Ze trouwden, kregen hun zoon Raymond in 1934, tot hun dood, binnen enkele maanden na elkaar, in 1971.

Bij het einde pinkte ik (opnieuw) een traan. Zo'n leven lang samen en alles wat daarbij aan liefde, leed en geschiedenis passeert maakt het verhaal ook wat melancholisch, maar op een fijne manier. Met subtiele humor en oh zo liefdevol getekend.As a result, we are made to feel the impact of the ageing process all the more closely, as we truly get to know both Ethel and Ernest, through all the highpoints and the inevitable lows. Consequently, the final few scenes are genuinely affecting, as we see both begin to struggle more and more with their daily routine and eventually succumb to illness within months of each other. For example, whilst we have all read about the evacuation of children from the cities in World War II, the sense of sorrow and loss is rarely displayed as clearly as Ethel’s reaction to the news. In doing so, the movie depicts some of the most defining periods of the twentieth century, taking us through Ethel and Ernest’s experiences of the Great Depression, World War II, right up to the moon landing of 1969.