"In this film, the subject is a street musician who operates a music box. Graphically close to Bruno Bozzetto's 'Signor Rossi,' he presents a large nose, typical in both Belgian comic strips and universal in cartoons. In this case, he mixes a conspicuous bi-dimentionality with volume, produced by the contrast between a dark flesh color and a clearer one, a simple method that gives a character a very particular presence. The humor, which is definitely present, has to convey a transparent message: in opposing the little man's music box to the borrowings from the real world (the juke-box, the dollar, the 'atomix girl'-billboard), Servais criticizes the society of consumption and its exclusively material values, rather than drawing an opposition between 'ancient' and 'modern.' "De valse noot" was Awarded in Antwerp."

-- Abstract from the book Raoul Servais, A Painter-Filmmaker's Journey by Philippe Moins and Jan Temmerman. A writer specializing in animation based in Brussels, Philippe Moins is the founder of the Brussels Festival of Cartoons and Animated Films.