King Tungun. © Jung Eun Lee, 2000.

King Tangun
Also from the University of Southern California comes another contemplative work, this time by Korean director Jun Eun Lee. An accomplished artist, Lee has shown her painting work in three solo shows, in addition to over fifty group shows throughout the world. In her graduate thesis film at USC, King Tangun, Lee tells a story from Korean mythology about the first king in Korea. Using cutouts and drawings, she depicts a bear and a tiger who pray to Holy Hwanung to be turned into human beings. Only the bear persists in fulfilling the requirements to stay in a cave for a hundred days, eating garlic; she is turned into a woman who later gives birth to the child who would become Korea's first king.

The film's dialogue (in English) is limited to voiceover and it is not the strongest element of the film; by far the majority of the work is accompanied only by music, which is a good decision. The film is slow-paced and employs a limited animation technique, but these work well with the subject matter. The bear and tiger characters are stylized in such a way that they are endearing and it is a pleasure to watch them. Like Airship, the movement in the film is artfully restrained. Also like Airship, this film imparts feeling even more than content; anyone unfamiliar with the Korean myth might have trouble understanding exactly what is going on. Nonetheless, the film is captivating, and I watched its gentle characters with pleasure. Clearly, others have as well. King Tangun has done well in festivals, earning a Special Prize for Children in Dong-A.LG International Festival of Animation, in Korea, and being selected for screenings in The World Animation Celebration (USA), the Ashland Film Festival (USA), the Sprockets Toronto International Film Festival for Children (Canada), the 42nd International Film Festival for Children and Youth (Czech Republic), and others.

The Stork. © Nina Paley, 2002.

The Stork
One might expect a similarly warm and soft film from the opening moments of The Stork, as we see the bird carrying its 'bundle of joy' -- a baby on its way to its new home. Suddenly, though, not one but several, then hundreds of storks fill the sky, dropping their 'bombs' into the unsuspecting natural environment. The bundles explode in a 'baby boom' (as director Nina Paley describes it), resulting in row after row of identical tract homes, SUVs and beautiful, smiling suburban family members -- mothers, fathers, and -- of course -- chubby, charming babies.

Paley explains that she was motivated to make the film because she is passionate about the cause of population control; indeed, the Internet's "Cruel Site of the Day" describes her as probably "the world's worst person to invite to a baby shower." But her film is effective, largely because she carefully controls the tone of the work. While Edvard Grieg's "Morning" provides a pastoral feeling to the film, Paley counters with visuals showing not only the destruction of the Disneyfied animated habitat but also more realistic-looking images of sprawling cities obtained with aerial photography.

Paley describes herself as self-taught, saying she began to animate in 1998. For this project, she employed Flash, Photoshop and Final Cut Pro. Paley intends to develop her 'animated documentary' into a longer project titled "Thank You for Not Breeding," for which she is fund-raising. More information is available at her Website, www.ninapaley.com/parasite.html.