Madama Butterfly Response

Madama Butterfly tells a tale that shouldn't need to be told - of a woman ripped from her child by the child's father it never knew. The claymation version is, somehow, even more human than one may assume inanimate storytellers could be. In his art,  Pjotr Sapegin portrays human emotion and makes his viewers feel deeply for his creations.
The closing scene, where the child's mother rips herself apart piece by piece, is particularly moving. This is something that would be impossible to fully portray with human actors without some tricky editing, but that is easily done with Sapegin's characters. The scene evokes discomfort and portrays "gore" without being graphic. The character appears to be mechanical, rather than made of flesh and blood, but the viewer has an idea of her as a human and thus empathizes with her as she tears herself apart.
With Madama Butterfly, Sapegin fulfills an artist's dream: to make one's art come alive. He makes his viewer fall in love with a woman who leads a life that is not perfect, but happy. He then tears her joy away in a moment and, with her happiness, the viewer's. Without dialogue and without actors -- armed with music and his creativity, he crafts carefully a tale of love and loss and the world is surely better for it.