Veteran indie filmmaker Bill Plympton is a hero of Landreth’s.

GS: Your earlier short films, The End (1995) and Bingo (1998), have a similar stylistic sensibility as Ryan. Bingo was a visual adaptation of a live theater performance, much like Ryan is a visual interpretation of your interview with Ryan. The End also has a reflexive surrealist narrative, similar to Ryan, as if to ask: What comes next... how will this all end? Do you find that you are exploring fundamentally similar themes in your films? How is your own artistic growth evidenced in your films?

CL: It’s very natural to use myself as a springboard for exploring themes. I am thinking of, by analogy, an artist named Max Beckmann who did dozens of paintings over a few decades, all of which involved him in the painting in one way or another. But the paintings themselves were very complex narratives with other characters that you would read from left to right, and you realize there was a whole narrative drama there. There he was always in one place or another providing, if not central elements, some important contributing element to a story that was beyond merely him. That’s certainly one theme that comes naturally for me: to use myself as a catalyst to explore some bigger stories or themes.

GS: You used to be an engineer doing experimental research in fluid dynamics. Animating, of course, was the next logical step. Why do you choose to animate?

CL: Because it’s fun. Doing the kind of computer art that I do, I wouldn’t do it if it weren’t just raw fun. Seriously. Engineering had a certain degree of fun to it, but there was an aspect that wasn’t taking advantage of my best talents.

GS: Do you find that you’re learning something about yourself through animation?

CL: Yeah, I am. I’m learning that I’m more patient than I thought I was. Also, both the left and right side of my brain gets a workout when I do this, so I’m learning how to integrate the analytical with the aesthetic.

GS: What do you feel is unique about animation, in how audiences relate to it, or in what it’s able to express?

CL: The kind of animation that I’m into stretches the definition of narrative. I think that Ryan does stretch that definition somewhat, in bringing in the documentary aspects, and by adding, I hope seamlessly, this very subjective visual aspect to make something that the audience might find jarring, at first, but they kind of get into the groove of it and go somewhere with it.

GS: Copperheart Ent. (producer of Ryan) is developing a feature-length animated film (Uberman), and earlier they had produced the first fully animated IMAX 3D movie (Cyberworld). Is your focus to continue to make auteur short films, or do you see yourself moving more into commercial work or features?

CL: I am always open to the idea of doing something longer format. I would like to do it on terms where I would have more creative control than is generally the case with studio films. That would probably involve the cost of doing these films coming down a tad more than they are at right now.

When I think of the feature films of Bill Plympton, he’s a real hero of mine in this respect. Sure, his films get a very limited release — largely in festivals and a few theatrical venues — but nonetheless he produces these on his own, on a very, very cheap budget, and he’s able to get a rate of return on it that allows him to keep doing this stuff, which is very inspiring for me.

I have a lot of hope that CG, although it’s certainly not there now, will evolve so that, instead of costing $90 million to make a film, it will cost $10 million (and maybe even less), like Sylvain Chomet’s Triplets of Belleville. When it becomes that cheap, you’re going to see some interesting things happening, and some of them may be coming from me.

Greg Singer is an animation welfare advocate, eating in Los Angeles.