Quote:
"The hyacinth as such does not appear in the film [The Hyacinth Child's Bedtime Story]; it is recollected only in the purplish colour used to surround the child being forcibly dominated at the commencement of the action. This is sufficient to reinforce the death and rebirth pattern of the metaphors. The child is superceded by the youth; the colours change largely to red, the traditional colour for blood, death, revolution, destruction, and life. While the ritual dance of the children procedes, the youth, excluded from the group activity, and alone, symbolically masturbates when he holds the candelabra and the set of burning candles between his legs. The religious import of this sequence is conveyed not only by means of the candle imagery and the awareness of purification through fire but also through the chantral music in the background."
-- William Dean

Source:
Dean, William. "Criticism and the Underground Film." Take One (Montreal), vol. 1, no. 9, 1968. (pp. 13-14)