I was in a quandary: my presence was urgently required; a gravely ill man was waiting for me in a village ten miles distant; a blizzard filled the space between me and my goal; I had a carriage, light, high-wheeled, eminently suited to our country roads; wrapped in my fur, with my Gladstone bag in my hand, I stood in the courtyard all ready to go; but the horse was missing, there was no horse.

(Franz Kafka, A Country Doctor)

So begins one of Kafka’s most enigmatic short stories. It is a nebulous tale of a country doctor summoned, on a mischievous night, to perform his duty only to find himself immersed in absurd setbacks. In 2007, the Japanese anime master Koji Yamamura released a remarkably beautiful adapatation of this masterpiece.

With the use of peculiar and ingenious distortion effects, visual and vocal, Yamamura created a masterpiece of his own. For all friends of Kafka, animated film, or of curious beauty in general!