Kidvid: Hearts & Flowers Fill Scarry's Busytown

February 5, 1998
Web posted at: 7:01 p.m. EST (0001 GMT)

By Scott Blakey

The origins of Valentine's Day (two martyrs of that name were executed) are obscure, but the February practice of choosing a sweetheart or special friend and sending a gift to the intended date back to the mid-1400s.

One rural tradition, noted by Chaucer, has it that February 14 was the day birds chose their mates, though one suspects this was a flight of fancy.

Whatever its beginnings, modern celebration results in huge profits for flower, greeting-card and candy merchants, and extra work for postal carriers.

And love also can be a tricky business as Huckleberry Cat and Lowly Worm and their Busytown pals discover in "The Busy World of Richard Scarry: Be My Valentine" (Paramount Home Video, 1998, animation, color, 25 minutes, $9.95). The video contains three separate stories.

"Be My Valentine" is the first Huck and Lowly offering of the season, based on the famous characters crafted by the late and gifted artist and storyteller. The animation and story lines maintain the series' high quality, and the world of Busytown continues along with its odd collection of characters, architecture and conveyances, such as pickle cars. It is top-notch viewing, with subtle messages, for children ages 4 to 8.

The title story "Be My Valentine" opens just as the school day is closing. Hilda Hippo turns to Lowly and tells him she has a valentine for him. Miss Honey, the teacher, reminds Hilda that it is the day before Valentine's Day.

Hilda is a little chagrined until Lowly tells her: "I'm making a valentine at home just for you, too, Hilda. It's a very special, sweet valentine, made with care and love."

Poor, smitten Hilda. "Oh, he must really love you," she says to herself, twirling about the classroom. "My simple valentine won't do at all." She tears the missive into pieces and rushes off to make "the biggest valentine ever."

But viewers quickly discover that Lowly, along with Huck, his sister and mother, are baking heart-shaped cookies, one for every one of the worm's pals, all of whom, he announces, are special, including Hilda.

When Huck runs to the store to buy more cookie decorations, he bumps into Hilda, arms laden with bags of goodies. Huck helps her home and discovers a huge valentine on a cart, filled with apples and decorated with balloons and flowers.

Hilda confides that this is for her secret admirer, Lowly. Huck suddenly realizes that disaster is about to strike.

"I've got to find a way to warn Lowly without breaking my promise to Hilda," he says.

Lowly is too dense, or preoccupied, to pick up Huck's hints, and on Valentine's Day, Hilda gets her cookie as she is pulling "the biggest valentine ever" to school. She flees, embarrassed and sobbing her eyes out, leaving her creation behind. It starts rolling on its own with Huck and Lowly in pursuit.

Without giving away too much, the story ends in typical Scarry fashion.

Later, thawing out, Hilda says it's "not what someone gives you; it's what they do that matters." Not a bad lesson.

The second story is a gentle costume fantasy, purporting to relate the origins of the holiday and setting it in Roman times. These Romans, though, are bears, and the would-be lovers are the emperor's shy secretary, Gideous, and the royal daughter, Valentina.

Sighs Gideous to his pal Maximus Mouse, "Valentina is the most beautiful bear in the entire empire, and she doesn't know I exist."

But the emperor knows and approves and, through sly trickery, gets Gideous to offer Valentina presents -- a heart-shaped cake, for one -- but the poor sap is so shy, he never shows his true colors. It takes an imperial act to set things right.

The third story, "The Match-Makers," finds Huck, Lowly and Hilda comparing notes on the adult world and how it's nice to be grown up and have a partner. "People in love always do nice things for each other," Hilda says.

They notice that the accident-prone Mr. Fumble and P.S. Pig, Busytown's mailperson, are both single, and the kids conspire to bring them together. They hatch a rather clever scenario.

But in Busytown, as in real life, the path to true love is rarely smooth.

(c) 1998, Scott Blakey. Distributed by Los Angeles Times Syndicate

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