Year: 1979
Format: 35mm Colour
Runtime: 6 min
Director: Eugene Fedorenko
Producer: Derek Lamb
Writer: Derek Lamb
Cinematographer: Robert Humble, Jacques Avoine, Richard Moras
Editor: Eugene Fedorenko
Animation: Eugene Fedorenko
Sound: Hans Strobl, Normand Roger
Production Company: National Film Board of Canada

Produced at the invitation of the United Nations in honour of UNICEF’s Declaration of Children’s Rights, Every Child is part of an hour-long omnibus work consisting of ten six-minute short films that celebrate the International Year of the Child. Every Child illustrates one of the ten principles of the Declaration, namely that every child is entitled to a name and a nationality.

Director-animator Eugene Fedorenko’s touching film tells the story of a baby who appears mysteriously on the doorstep of a busy executive. The baby is then passed from household to household down the block; no one is interested in caring for a child with no name or identity. Finally, arriving on the doorstep of a home that shows concern and compassion, the child is taken in.

Every Child was a collaboration between Fedorenko, writer-producer Derek Lamb and Les Mimes électriques, a Montreal-based mime troupe. In the absence of "real" words and music, clever gags and believable personality traits are effectively complemented by a soundtrack of vocal effects created and performed by the mimes. The result is a Chaplinesque combination of laughter and pathos, humour and sadness.

Every Child received a Genie Award for Outstanding Animation and an Academy Award® for Animated Short Film.   Voice work by Les Mimes électriques.