A mix of animation films by the master of animation Tezuka, (Astroboy's creator). The DVD contains thirteen shorts with different animation styles and techniques made between 1962-1986.
"Tales of the Street Corner" could also be called the secret life of a back street's wall posters. We see how the characters in them communicate through music, and how they reflect their time and the events happening in the outside world. I thought the idea was original an the music good, but the short is a bit too long and monotonous, while the kid-teddy bear relationship is underdeveloped.
"Male" is a very short piece, very schematic, with an indirect narrative, as the face of a man and of his cats looking at him, tell the story of the drama -not seen by the viewer- of the killing of his wife. An experiment in visual narrative.
"Memory" is a philosophical short, which uses collage techniques, that reflects on the nature of memory and what is left behind what memory is not there. What would happen if our planet and humans disappeared and there was no memory left about their existence?
"Mermaid" uses traditional storytelling and simple animation techniques, to show how our perception and feelings of reality construct our emotional reality. A boy rescues a fish from the seashore, but when left in a pool, the fish transforms into a mermaid and the boy falls in love with her. However, his family just see his strange behaviour and try to force him to leave his fantasy and return the fish into the sea. Is all a dream?
"The Drop" is a funny absurd story with very schematic draft animation. A sea-cast tries to quench his thirst with the only three drops of drinkable water in the boat, which are located on the raft's mast. One of those stories that might have inspired all the big animation producers in the world, Pixar's short included.
"Pictures at an Exhibition" uses the eponymous musical composition piece by Mussorgsky. The camera scrolls in front of a series of paintings on a wall, in a museum, and stops in some of them to give life and put a story to some of the images, with different styles of animation. Although I thought the idea was excellent, the piece was not engaging.
"The Genesis", it is a parody of the Biblical story of Adam and Eve in which Eve has something to say to the world! The short is very funny and shot in very schematic animation.
"Jumping" is truly an experimental film both in concept and realisation. The camera's positioning and angling serve as the eyes of something or somebody that/who starts jumping along a suburbian street. The script tells us that it is a girl, but I see it more like an insect or a bird that jumps wider and higher each time, so much so that we see the city, other cities, the forest, the sea, a volcano, a country in war... the whole world, as small, varied and complicated as it is. It is very meditative in a way, as goes from the perception of the self to the wholeness and perspective of the self within the Universe. The film was shot in one cut with 4,000 motion pictures.
"Broken Down Film" is a masterpiece of a short. It is shot in B&W and looks like an old scratched stained film reel. We see a cowboy and his horse trying to rescue a girl in the American West. At first sight, really looks like one of those prehistoric Disney's Micky Mouse silent shorts, but then, the fun starts, and the characters keep going out of the frame and struggling with the damages of the film. The hero has to fight the villain but also the broken down film. An amazing concept and realisation, and so charming!
"Push" is an environmental friendly short that reflects Tezuka's worries about the state of the planet. I would say is the more Japanese short in the lot, as vending machines are everywhere and sell everything - one of the things that defines Japanese way of life. It is a depopulated world where our hero gets everything he wants and needs from a machine. He is on a trip to see God and rescue the planet by replacing the existing one with a new one, but there is no machine that does so.
"Muramasa" is an anti-violent cryptic message presented in traditional Japanese folk fight animation. Muramasa is a magic sword that is stuck in a straw man, but when a Samurai tries to get it and use it to cut the straw man, the piece of straw becomes a human who bleeds from the cut.
"Legend of the Forest" is an impressive piece of animation that could remind you of Fantasia, with Tchaikovsky's Fourth Symphony (1st and 4th movements) used as inspiration for the story and as musical background. It shows the life of animals and fairies in the forest and the negative influence of human settlement and exploitation of the same. Although the message or the script are not new, the animation is remarkable, as we see the characters evolve from drawing sketches, pass through different stages of drawing and animation - from Disney's to the animation in vogue in the 1980s.
"Self Portrait" it is tiny piece - an animated portrait of Tezuka, in which his drawn face turns, as in a slot machine, into another face.
This collection of shorts shows the versatility in visual style and narrative of master Tezuka, as well as his very personal approach to animation, which not always can be categorised as Manga or even as Japanese. The collection also shows his philosophical worries and views on the world, and offers pieces that, despite being very personal, are very open to interpretation. This is not a film for everybody, but for lovers of experimental animated films.
Watch it on YouTube
An Oscar nominated, cult short by Don Hertzfeldt that showcases several mini-shorts related to product promotion and children teaching segments. They are linked by a fictional frame that says that these works were presented and rejected and that the author grew increasingly crazy, the next short becoming even crazier. It is just a summary you see repeated in too many film sites taken literally. Hertzfeldt has never accepted any commercial assignment.
The animation style is very simple and schematic, with simple lines, black and white, bare or very simple backgrounds, with some splashes of bright colour. The mood of all the vignettes is very childish, funny and increasingly gory, with that sort of brutishness that some small children show when mistreating little animals without knowing that what they are doing is wrong or harmful.
The humour goes from deadpan, to absurd to plain hilarious, and it is very entertaining. "My anus is bleeding" and "funny hats only" are my favourite segments.
Something different and refreshing. Anarchist in the best sense of the word.
Not for children!
This is one of the most thought-provoking short films I have seen lately, and compulsory viewing if you are interested in ethical dilemmas. It poses many interesting questions to the viewer in a fun way, and it makes its point so strongly that is difficult to argue it. Some of the questions that came to my mind after viewing the film are: Why do we eat meat if we have other sources of protein in the vegetable world? If the answer is yes, which one do we choose, especially having almost every animal at our disposal? Does cuteness and ugliness play a role in the food we eat or the food you eat? Would you rather eat a cute edible exotic animal or an ugly non-exotic one? Is our relationship with our pets a denial of our own animal instincts? Why don't we eat our pets? If we rear an animal as pet and you were starving, would you eat it? Why people get crossed about Koreans eating an edible of dogs and not us eating lambs or sucking piglets?
The film is very funny and well made, and will delight and repulse you, both at once.
Available for viewing at:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ybop2CgBSfc
This is one of the most incredible short animated films I have seen lately. It is difficult to explain why such an abstract clip is so engaging and thought-provoking, so full of energy and mystery. It's not only well drawn and spectacularly animated, but it has a very enigmatic atmosphere and energy. At watching it, I thought of those energies that create and keep together different elements in a conglomerated rock, the way some geological elements bond and conglomerate forming almost unbreakable rocks. However, this is not a lesson in Geology, it is a minimalist piece in which cubical animated stones gather and mate following indescribable energies that attract or reject a stone cube to each other. It is a courtship dance, in a way. It doesn't matter if the events happen in a sci-fi planet or in a fantasy world, in the present or the past. One wonders, why this is happening and what brings the different elements together. What are those energies that we see in the story and what is coming. One wants more!
On the other hand, the story not having a main character, cute or hate-able, to which pin the viewer's attention, this has to have a specific visual narrative, sound, music and magic to keep us watching. I found amazing that Boulbès was able to create so much with so little elements.
The film is elegantly minimalist, energetic and powerful and the interpretation options are wide. Therefore, it will satisfy any inquisitive mind and animation lover looking for something new.
A mesmerising conceptual short film from the point of view of conception, realisation and cinematic narrative. Not for everybody, as it is very abstract.
Elektra is a pop group formed by triplets Sara, Cleo and Aracne who raise to world stardom quickly, becoming international celebrities. When they get sick, infected by a mysterious virus, they have to retire to have surgery on their vocal cords. They reappear a year later, but their performance style, their songs and they very appearance have completely changed, and the former pop group is no longer recognizable. After their controversial tour they decide to retire, and offer a last performance on TV, to be shown around the world. That is when the nightmare starts.
The story is just fantastic. The way the Greek Myth has been revamped, still being recognisable and horrific is incredible - Brilliant! The drawing, in colour and BW, but especially the latter, is just fantastic, very powerful, and detailed, with a great use of the chiaroscuro and ink use. The work of a virtuoso drawer. The movie is mostly a sequence of still drawings with some animated parts, the coloured ones. There must be reason why the director did not made the whole movie in motion animation (economic reasons? lack of background in animation? an artistic reason?), but the film still works and left me in awe.
I love non-linear stories, but I think the director has chosen the wrong narrative for this story, as the movie starts in the present and tells most of it in a flashback. The story is so good and powerful that a linear story from the past to the present would have been much more surprising, horrific, shocking and mysterious. Starting from the end does not improve the result of the story at all. Perhaps it works on paper, but not as much on film. At least to me. It is excusable, though, as Sanz is a Comics artist not a proper animator. Still his work is impressive, as well as the story, tempo and suspense of this film, which are great, as well as the ending.
One of the best short films I have seen this year.
The film can be watched on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oir5N8mqXaE&feature=colike
The author's website deserves a visit: http://salvadorsanz.blogspot.com/
