Sending animations by email

Can you help?, just sent an email to friends in Canada, & for fun tried to send a cartoon animation, from "My Pictures" but when I opened the attachment in my Sent Messages [Outlook Express] the image was static, no movement.
On an earlier occasion, I sent a short video clip of the Mars Lander [2 or 3 seconds] & it arrived AS an animation
Could seeing it in my Sent Messages, would have appeared static, this end, but arrived OK on receipt?
What I am really saying, I suppose is, am I doing it correctly? I have "Smiley Central", they're OK.
Thanx.

What sort of a file is it? Outlook doesn't have to support every conceivable animation format. But if the animation plays on your comp and you sent the file intact then it will play on the other side as well.

You can test it out by sending the same thing to yourself.

Thanx, Nodsu, will do, ....didn't think of that.

Well, Nodsu, I did try sending the same animation to myself, as you suggested [thanx], with the same result, no movement,.....as to what sort of file, I'm not sure, I just put "animations" on Google, & logged on to one of the sites, can't remember which, the animation worked there, & I sent it to My Pictures, then opened, & "sent to mail recipient" on Outlook Express.

Just right click on the thing in my pictures, select properties. Also, save the attachment from Outlook to some file and try opening it outside of the Bad Mail Client.