Very Semi-Serious

The documentary takes up cartooning. At its centre are single panel drawings. The known home of those drawings is the New Yorker. The magazine publishes new cartoons every week. The documentary looks at how that selection is made. The magazine’s cartoon editor is Bob Mankoff. Mankoff goes through the drawings that come in. Hundreds arrive every week. Some of the cartoonists have been at it for years. Others are trying for the first time. The camera watches both. Rejection is part of the work. The film looks at how humour gets built. Leah Wolchok directed the eighty three minute documentary. The American production was finished in 2015.