February, 2002
SLAMDANCE SHOWED DON THOMAS' "PEDRO + TONY?" AND TOM GIBBONS' "THE HUNGER ARTIST" The festival, held in Park City, Utah, January 11-19, showed Thomas' Pedro + Tony? and Gibbons' The Hunger Artist. " Gibbons' film won the audience award for best short! (see a feature article about it in this newsletter). He told us, "all I can say is how shocked I was at the response to the film. Even without winning anything there was quite a buzz, constantly, about it. I wasn't really prepared for it." Gibbons plans to show The Hunger Artist at our February 20 event and it will be in a best of Slamdance show in LA in March at the Egyptian Theater.
Thomas' stop-motion film is a sensitive and funny portrait of a quarreling couple (a dog and a chicken) that learns to work through their prejudice and anger in order to make amends. It is a beautifully animated, impressive work about love, conflict and resolution. The characters have wonderfully expressive facial animation. Besides being shown at Slamdance it is being shown at the San Francisco International Asian American Film Festival, March 7 - 17. Thomas told us, "Sundance and Slamdance were a total circus, although most people wanted to make it seem otherwise. I think I was among those who made it more obvious, however. I spent six days promoting my film dressed in a full-body chicken suit! I was interviewed by the BBC, MTV France, PBS Texas, The Sundance Channel, and I am in the Los Angeles Time's Southern California Living Section today (Sunday) in an article on "Sundance Fashion" (there's a picture of me in my chicken suit, next to a picture of Mira Sorvino and Mariah Carey) The LA Times refer to me as "the likes of the truly independent filmmaker, who is the embodiment of the spirit of Sundance." "On camera the BBC asked me, 'don't you feel stupid walking up and down the street dressed in a chicken costume?' I said, 'No, I'm just doing what everyone else here is, promoting my film and looking for work.'" Gordon "Don" Thomas has been animating, writing and directing films for over 27 years. He began when he was 7. He has been awarded over a dozen festival prizes and his work has been shown in numerous festivals in the US, South Africa, Italy, Canada and Brazil, and on PBS and the Sci-Fi Channel. He is currently writing a feature-length stop-motion script and looking for a distributor for Pedro + Tony? He can be reached at deebo@sfsu.edu OUR JANUARY OPEN SCREENING WAS FULL OF WONDERFUL SURPRISESby Karl Cohen You never know in advance what to expect. This year 15 works were shown and the quality was extremely high. All got so much applause that it was impossible to know which were the audience's favorites. I guess all were. The program opened on a high note with Nina Paley's Lexi, a superb artistic use of computer rotoscope technology. It is a visual treat with a top soundtrack by Nik Phelps. It should win a few festival honors. Lexi is a hard act to follow, but Marion Gothier's Going South was also a smash hit. Her 3D animation, done at DeAnza, is painted to look 2D. It almost looks like traditional animation. More important, her birds flying in formation begin to misbehave and the humor builds and builds and builds. There is a short psa-like message at the end. The exceptional soundtrack turned out to be by Normand Roger from Montreal. His tracks are on films by Frederic Back. Next came yet another surprise comic hit, Framed by Eric Carney. It is a clever 3D work about a man doing battle with his environment. It was also made at DeAnza. It is a highly original film that is almost as funny as the scene in Duck Amuck that may have inspired it. Shirley "Cosand" Smith showed Lost Sock, a clever work with a few unexpected surreal surprises. Her delightful one minute 16mm film was done on cels has an excellent track by Nik Phelps. See the Truth, a stop-motion puppet film by Jerold Howard is an entertaining work containing a serious message about prejudice. The writing is sophisticated so it isn't preachy and it is extremely well made (Howard worked on James and the Giant Peach). I hope it is distributed to schools and shown on TV. It could help to make this a better world if it gets the right distributor. Last year John Atkinson showed a fine 3D cgi film, and his latest, The Daydreamer, is even better! It has won festival recognition and hopefully it will win more awards. Stefan Gronsky showed his delightful award winner The Box. This touching outer space tale has been in over 40 festivals. It shows that excellent shorts can be made on a Mac at home if you have some skill and a great imagination. The rest of the program was also filled with impressive work. Geoffrey Clark's In the Vault is a well animated and ambitious 3D cgi movie. Yun Joh's The News demonstrates her strength as a designer and colorist. Amy Sprague treated us to Home Tweet Home and Hogan's Ball. Romiel from DeAnza showed Adopt A Dog and Exploding Head. Roxie Chen, also a DeAnza student, made Samurai, a ferocious tale with a funny twist. Reginald Evens filled the room with laughter a few times with The Main Event. Evens, who likes the name Roody Poo, is a talented teenager who is also a volunteer at the Exploratorium. THE NOMINEES FOR THE BEST ANIMATED FEATURE WILL BE SELECTED FROM THE FOLLOWING: Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius, Marco Polo: Return to Xanadu, Monsters, Inc.; Osmosis Jones, The Prince of Light, Shrek, The Trumpet of the Swan, Vampire Hunter D: Bloodlust and Waking Life. While Shrek and Monsters, Inc. are well known as Bay Area productions, Marco Polo also has ties to our area. Writer-producer Chris Holter went to SF State and Arnie Wong, the director of animation, worked in our area for several years. It was shown at FAF's festival at the Castro in November. It was made for kids and they love it. Disney did not submit Atlantis: The Lost Empire according to Jerry Beck who runs Cartoon Research. Beck writes, "The nominating process for this award will begin with a 100-member screening committee chaired by Academy Governor Tom Hanks and comprised half of animators and half of members of the Academy's other 13 branches. That group will view the nine films and will determine the three nominees. The nominees will be announced on February 12. All voting Academy members worldwide are eligible to vote to select the film that will receive the Oscar on Sunday, March 24." cartoonresearch.com ILM WINS TWO SCIENTIFIC AND TECHNICAL ACHIEVEMENT ACADEMY AWARDS Twenty-one Academy Awards for scientific and technical achievement will be presented on March 2 at the Regent Beverly Wilshire Hotel. Fourteen of the awards go to recipients for creating technology used in the field of animation and visual effects. The awards are based upon recommendations of the Scientific and Technical Awards Committee, chaired by Academy visual effects branch governor Richard Edlund. ILM's first award goes to John Anderson, Jim Hourihan, Cary Phillips and Sebastian Marino for the development of the ILM Creature Dynamics System. This system makes hair, clothing, skin, flesh and muscle simulation both directable and integrated within a character animation and rigging environment. The second goes to Dr. Steve Sullivan and Eric Schafer for the development of the ILM Motion and Structure Recovery System (MARS.) The MARS system provides analysis of camera motion and object motion, and their dimensions. It employs a rich set of user-interface tools and sophisticated algorithms. FOUR EFFECTS FEATURES THAT ILM WORKED ON ARE BEING CONSIDERED FOR OSCAR NOMINATIONS FOR SPECIAL EFFECTS There are 8 films on the "LONG list" (usually 7, but there was a tie for the 7th film when the Academy voted). ILM worked on A. I: Artificial Intelligence, Harry Potter, Jurassic Park III and Pearl Harbor. The other films being considered are Black Hawk Down, Cats and Dogs, The Fast and The Furious and The Lord of the Rings. The nominees will be announced on Tuesday, February 12, at 5:30 am PST and The Academy Awards will be presented on March 24, 2002 at the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood. "SHREK"CONTINUES TO WIN MAJOR AWARDS The latest honors include the People's Choice Award for favorite motion picture of the year and the Broadcast Film Critics Association Critics' Choice Award for best animated feature. PIXAR HONORED BY LA MUSEUM OF ART The Los Angeles County Museum of Art celebrated the 15th anniversary of Pixar in January. Pixar founder John Lasseter participated in a retrospective screening that was hosted by ABC-TV film critic Joel Siegel. Clips from their four features and five animated short films were shown. Also scheduled to attend were Pete Docter, director of Monsters, Inc., Ed Catmull, president of Pixar Animation Studios, and other staff members. PIXAR'S WEB SITE INCLUDES LOTS OF SHORT FILMS, TRAILERS, FILM CLIPS and other things. There is even a "How we do it" section. www.pixar.com WILD BRAIN TEAMS UP WITH DENMARK'S EGMONT IMAGINATION TO CO-PRODUCE "VANILLA PUDDING" The development deal calls for 26 thirty minute TV shows. The series will feature a quirky little girl who imagines herself as a superhero. The series was created by Wild Brain director Nicholas Weigel and the pilot was written by Emmy Award winner Sherri Stoner. Wild Brain's press release says their animated star "handles the innate trials and tribulations of growing up by imploding into her vibrant imagination and becoming an idealistic superhero, capable of stomping out any bullies, injustice or fear that stands in her way. Once she has conquered her problem in her imaginative world, she will snap back to reality, empowered with new insight and ready to face up to her real world predicament." BAM! OF SAN JOSE TO PRODUCE VIDEO GAMES BASED ON THE ANIMATED SERIES "SAMURAI JACK" The Bay Area company recently reached an agreement with Cartoon Network and Warner Bros. Consumer Products to publish these games. In recent years they have licensed the rights to make video games based on the television shows Powerpuff Girls, Dexter's Lab and Yogi Bear. Samuri Jack may also be made into a live action feature by New Line Cinema. SUNDANCE ONLINE FILM FESTIVAL INCLUDED "GONE BAD, EPISODE 2" by Marco Bertoldo, director and John Evershed, producer, two Bay Area talents. It is a 3D animated horror movie with zombies. It was one of 12 works selected for this year's event. Additional credits for Gone Bad, Episode 2, are writers Niccolo Ammanti and Marco Bertoldo, and art and animation by Brittnell Anderson, Marco Bertoldo, Kelly Kleider, Art Matsuura, Andy Murdock and Goose Ramirez. BOB VAUGHN, WHO ACCOMPANIED SILENT FILMS ON THEATER ORGANS FOR A GOOD PART OF THE 20TH CENTURY, DIED SATURDAY, JANUARY 5 He died in his sleep at a rest home in Bakersfield, close to his son and daughter. They brought his body back to San Francisco and buried him next to his wife in Colma. He was 90. Bob was 15 when he began his professional career as an organist in silent movie palaces just as talkies were about to put a temporary end to it. In the 1960's he was back doing occasional performances with silent films. He was part of a group that found, rebuilt and installed a theater organ at the Avenue Theatre in San Francisco. He played that organ for lots of Friday night shows over a 17 year period. He also built a fine silent film collection (mostly 16mm prints) that he accompanied in public performances. His travels as a performer took him to many cities in the US. In the Bay Area he performed at the PFA, UC Theatre, Castro and at lots of other halls. Some of his shows were the standard classics, but he also helped introduce many rare works. He even had the stamina to accompany early revival performances of Gance's Napoleon and D. W. Griffith's Intolerance (both are extremely long features). Vaughn loved to include animation in his programs. I have wonderful memories of visiting him in his home in the 1970's and seeing for the first time rare works in his collection by Starevitch, Winsor McCay, Otto Messmer, the Fleischers and other animators. Gary Meyer who ran the UC for many years (and now runs the Balboa) writes, "Into his mid-80's Bob rode one of his other loves...a motorcycle. He would show up at the UC on his bike, hop off and unzip his tight leather suit to reveal a black tuxedo in contrast to his full head of silver hair. What a way to start the evening!" "I had some unusual requests of Bob but he never flinched. Every June 30 he relished leading the audience in "Happy Birthday U.C. Theatre." One Halloween we showed a double feature of The Rocky Horror Picture Show with The Phantom of the Opera starring Lon Chaney. The spotlight made it hard for him to see the audience as he made his opening comments. At the film's finish the audience went wild. Bob stood to take his much-deserved bows with a pleased look. The house lights came up so he could see the 1000 cheering new fans...dressed in the most outrageous Rocky garb. He slyly smiled. It was a new experience for both him and most of those in the audience. These are a few of the images I'll always remember of Bob Vaughn, accompanied by the sweet sounds of his playing." PDI ANIMATOR EDIP AGI HAS DIED according to an e-mail from John Canemaker. He was a young animator when he worked with him in NYC. John says he worked at PDI on SHREK and other films. A memorial for Edip was planned for January 26 at Shoup park in Los Altos, Ca. THERE IS A "PHANTOM INVESTIGATOR" DISPLAY in a window of the Lowes' Metreon theater complex. The stop-motion work has been completed and live action work is almost done. The TV series was animated with a mix of local talent and people from Vinton's studio in Portland. ALTERNATIVE PRESS EXPO, FEB. 9-10, HERBST PAVILION at Fort Mason, San Francisco. It is produced by the people who do Wondercon in Oakland (April 19-21, Oakland Convention Center) and the giant Comic Con in San Diego (July 31 - Aug. 4) For more information www.comic-con.org or PO Box 128458, San Diego, CA 92212-8458 THERE IS AN EXCELLENT PARODY OF eBAY at capnwacky.com/eGad/main Will a nasty lawyers shut this fine moment of humor down? LOCAL SCREENINGSSat. Feb 2 at 2:15 and Tues. Feb. 5 at 9:30 pm ANIMATION EXTRAVAGANZA at the INDIE FEST at the Roxie. This could be an outstanding program as it includes HUBERTS' BRAIN (Wild Brain) and THE HUNGER ARTIST (Tom Gibbons). Also in the show is OKENKA by Joseph Cahill (said to be an apprentice to Jan Svankmajer), TERMINATOR TOMATOES (Suzanne Twining) and 4 other films. There are other animated shorts mixed in with live action shorts at the Indie Festival. One such show is THE MOLEHILLS MADNESS 2/2, 12pm at the New College, 2/5 at 7:15 at Studio Z; 2/8 at 5, at Expression in Emeryville. (415) 820-3907 www.sfindie.com Sun. Feb. 3 at 9:15 pm and Wed. Feb. 6 at 2:45 BILL PLYMPTON'S MUTANT ALIENS (83 min.) with his short EAT. At the INDIE FEST at the Roxie. Monday, Feb. 4, 6:30 pm, VOLERE VOLARE from Italy (1991, 95 min. subtitles) by Maurizio Nichetti and Guido Manuli, live action with animated sequences. Italian Cultural Institute, 425 Washington, SF (415) 788-7142 Sat. Feb. 9, SPROCKET ENSEMBLE on WEST COAST LIVE, KALW-FM, 10 am to noon. Sunday, February 10, 1 pm, CARTOON CREATURES, 7 shorts from England, Canada, New Zealand and the US. Includes Angelina in the Wings, Binka and the Snowy Day, Bully Dance, Click, Clack, Moo; Incredible Creature, The Magic of Anansi and Space Case. Animators include Virginia Wilkos, Janet Perlman and Maciek Albreht. For ages 5+ at the Pacific Film Archive, Berkeley. Space Case Thursday, Feb. 14, SPROCKET ENSEMBLE VALENTINE PARTY "two sets of mainly music with two different films each set" at 7:30 & 9:30, Foley's Iris House, 243 O'Farrell, $10 (415) 681-3189 Wednesday, Feb. 20, ASIFA'S OPEN SCREENING FOR PROFESSIONAL STUDIOS with work from ILM, PDI, WILD BRAIN, TIPPETT STUDIOS and other companies plus TOM GIBBONS' THE HUNGER ARTIST, Exploratorium, 7:30 pm, free. Tuesday, February 26, IDEAS IN ANIMATION WITH THE SPROCKET ENSEMBLE, "live music set to contemporary animation" at 7:30 & 9:30, Minna Street Gallery, 111 Minna St., SF, (415) 681-3189 SORRY ABOUT PRINTING THE ERRONEOUS INFORMATION ABOUT A FAITH HUBLEY TRIBUTE last month at our Museum of Modern Art. The obituary published in the S.F. Chronicle was probably a rewrite of the much longer obit run in the NY Times. It said a screening was going to be at the Museum of Modern Art. The Chronicle writer didn't state it was at the MOMA in NY and not our MOMA, so I was confused and assumed it was here. NATIONAL NEWSUPA's "THE TELL-TALE HEART" HAS BEEN ADDED TO THE NATIONAL FILM REGISTRY Each year The Library of Congress adds 25 films that are "culturally, historically or aesthetically" significant to the list. The list is designed to reflect the full breadth and diversity of America's film heritage, thus increasing public awareness of the richness of American cinema and the need for its preservation. The 1953 UPA film is a visually stunning work with a powerful narration by James Mason. This dramatic retelling of Edgar Allen Poe's short story uses camerawork rather than a lot of character animation to propel us through the film. Jerry Beck's cartoonresearch.com gives the following credits for the film: Producer: Steven Bosustow, Director: Ted Parmalee, Design and Color: Paul Julian, Color by Technicolor, Story Adaptation: Bill Scott and Fred Grable, Animation: Pat Matthews, Cinematographer: Jack Eckes, Music: Boris Kremenliev, Narrator: James Mason. There are now 325 films on the National Film Registry's list. ASIFA IN LA WILL HOLD A BOOK SIGNING WITH MIKE BARRIER, AUTHOR OF "HOLLYWOOD CARTOONS," FEB. 7 at their Animation Center, 721 S. Victory Blvd. Burbank. (818) 842-8330
"HOW TO WRITE FOR ANIMATION" is a book by Jeffrey Scott that will be published this spring by The Overlook Press (distributed by Penguin-Putnam) at $27.95. It will be available from Amazon.com. Chapters in the first part include how to write a premise, outline, descriptions, scripts, story beats, dialog, funny stuff, features, for the Internet, for series, presentations, bibles and pilots. There is a section on selling your animated project including chapters on how to get an agent, how to break into toon writing, working without an agent, how to "pitch" your project, and "How to Prosper In Toon Town." There are also sample scripts and other useful things included.
WHY IS IMAX STOCK CLIMBING UPWARDS SO QUICKLY? - A few months ago IMAX stock hit a low of 55 cents a share. Now it is heading upwards towards $3.25 a share. Why? They bought back about $90 million of the company's debts for 24 cents on the dollar, making it an attractive "buy" for investors. Of course would you be happy if you were paid back 24% of what you lent somebody?
INTERESTED IN SEEING DISNEY'S "SONG OF THE SOUTH" ON DVD OR VHS? Disny.go.com has a pole asking people if they want to see it in either format. The film hasn't been available for many years due to objections from some people about the depiction of blacks. When the film opened the NAACP called it racist depiction of history. I recently discovered there is a web site dedicated to the film that is run by a loving fan at songofthesouth.net
ANIMATION WRITERS BATTLE NICKELODEON The L.A. Weekly ran a feature article in the Dec. 21-27 issue that explains the current fight between the Writers Guild and Nickelodeon Animation Studios. Writers on live action productions are union members and get residuals, are better paid and get other benefits. Nick can afford to pay cartoon writers more (they made $887 million in ad revenues in 2000), but they refuses to negotiate a contract with the union representing the writers. The writers want a union to represent them, but it seems Nick would rather fight than give their writers union benefits. Writers of live action half-hour shows at Nick are paid more than $6,000 for 10 reruns according to the article. The animation union claims "every prime-time animated episode generates $14 million in profit over five years."
ROGER RAMJET ON DVD Image Entertainment will be releasing two DVDs of that great all-American TV hero Roger Ramjet on 2/26. Each disc will include 15 episodes of this great spoof of popular culture in the 1960's. Each disc will retail at $14.99. Ramjet used a lot of irreverent humor and I think it is second only to Rocky and Bullwinkle for humor in early TV cartoon series.
The animation may have been limited, but the writing made it a hit. Unfortunately to get his super power he took proton pills. A few years later TV stations were afraid to show the series as the war on drugs made pill popping heroes a no no.
SHOW HONORING TV ANIMATION AT THE FULLERTON MUSEUM CENTER, NOW THROUGH MAY 12 The show features about 125 items (cels, drawings, etc.) and is called "Superwacky Animation on Television, 1949 - 2000." Actually the date should have been 1950, as Crusader Rabbit, the first series regularly scheduled, didn't get on the air until 1950 as a local show in L.A. At 301 N. Pomona Ave. Fulllerton, CA 92832.
MARC ELIOT, WHO WROTE A FICTITOUS HOT SELLING BIOGRAPHY ABOUT WALT DISNEY IN THE EARLY 1990'S AND A 2ND AUTHOR ARE CLAIMING DISNEY WAS AN ILLEGITIMATE CHILD BORN OF DIFFERENT PARENTS IN SPAIN If Walt wasn't related to the rest of the Disney family, I wonder how they explain that he looks a lot like his brother Roy? Frankly, does anybody really care who his parents were? His importance is the incredible company he created and the products they produced. The Spanish Connection by Giles Tremiett is an extremely long article available on line in the British Guardian, 11/30/01. guardian.co.uk/archive It is a lot of bunk...
ERNEST PINTOFF DIED JAN. 12, AGE 70 He won an Oscar in 1963 for The Critic, an Oscar nomination in 1960 for The Violinist (with the voice of Carl Reiner) and lots of praise for The Interview (with a "far out" jazz star), 1960. He went on to a successful career in live action TV series and teaching at USC. He also lectured at UCLA, CCAL Arts and other schools and wrote 2 books on animation schools. I contributed to his The Complete Guide to Animation and Computer Graphics Schools, 1995, and at the time he was an extremely sharp and humerous person to talk to.
TOM & JERRY ANIMATOR RAY PATTERSON DIED DECEMBER 30 He was 90 years old. His 64 year career in animation began in 1929 at the Charles Mintz studio. A decade later he moved to Disney, where he animated on Pluto cartoons and on Fantasia and Dumbo. In 1941 he joined MGM's Hanna-Barbera unit as an animator on Tom and Jerry cartoons. He took a year off to help David Hand establish his studio in England for the Rank Organization. He left MGM in 1954 to become co-founder of the Grant-Ray-Lawrence Studios which closed in the late 1960's. He then worked for Hanna-Barbera where he co-directed the feature Charlotte's Web. He eventually became Hanna-Barbera's vice-president of animation direction. He retired in 1993.
DAVID SWIFT DIED ON NEW YEARS EVE He was an assistant animator at Disney in the late 30's. He went on strike in 1941, but midway into the strike he grew disillusioned and crossed the line. Someone angered by his action scratched his car. In the 1950's he directed the Mr. Peepers TV show with Wally Cox. Back at Disney he directed Haley Mills films. At Columbia he directed How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. I think it was Tom Sito who told me "he remained an animator at heart and he frequently hung out with us. He was a funny and gentle soul."
AN EVENING OF REMEMBERANCE The Screen Cartoonists Union, ASIFA-Hollywood and Women In Animation, held a joint non-denominational gathering to remember their colleagues in animation who passed away in 2001. The event's flyer listed Robert Abel, Ted Berman, Al Dempster, Anne [Caples] Drinkwater, Mary Fallis, Frank Frezzo, Mabel Gesner, Billy Greene, Bill Hanna, Kent Holaday, Faith Hubley, Pat Jencks, Shirley Kahn, Perry Kiefer, Jan Lenica, Maia [Susan] Mazer, John Miller, Lee Mishkin, Gray Morrow, Lorenzo Music, Maurice Noble, Jane Nordin, Joan Pabian, Bill Pratt, Seymour Riet, Sam Singer, Billie Lou Watt, Sam Weiss and Norman Hall Wright. The event was held at the Hollywood Heritage Museum, the former Laskey-DeMille Barn near the Hollywood Bowl.
by Karl F. Cohen, written for Film Art Foundation's Release Print and printed here with permission of their editor Shari Kizirian
When Tom Gibbons was awarded the Ken Willard Memorial Award in 1997 by FAF, no one really knew much about the recipient except he wanted to produce an ambitious project based on a short story by Franz Kafka. His preliminary sketches were impressive and he had worked as a stop-motion animator on James and the Giant Peach and on other highly visible projects. He had made personal shorts, but his exhibition record was slim.
The people who award the prize should be congratulated for taking a risk with Gibbons as the completed film is a visual masterpiece. The Hunger Artist is a finely crafted work that has the maturity of a film by a seasoned filmmaker. The use of distorted German Expressionist inspired designs for the sets and characters was perfect for the project. Gibbons' main character is an angular gaunt 3 dimensional figure, while the subordinate figures are 2 dimensional. When they turn we see how thin they are, which takes on a symbolic meaning.
The film unfolds slowly, but it doesn't drag. Shots are long enough to suggest the boredom of the hunger artist, but by using fades, a variety of camera angles, a finely crafted soundtrack and other simple techniques Gibbons keeps the pace moving. Along the way there are fascinating surreal surprises, unusual dream sequences and rich details and textures to his sets and characters. Unlike most American films that have a European look, I do not feel he was trying to emulate the Brothers Quay, Jan Svankmajer or anybody else. His work has a unique look to it.
One moment that stands out is a transition from the present to the memory of a past event that was enormously successful in the artist's mind. After a close-up of the artist's face we see and hear cage bars flung open. Then we see him standing erect from behind as he seemingly floats towards the light at the end of a dark tunnel. Next we see the wheels of a giant cart being pushed by surreal 2D puppets into some sort of arena. From a different angle we see the artist standing on the cart. Suddenly an enormous black shadow emerges. It becomes a powerful grotesque ringmaster with no legs (a 3D puppet twice the size of the artist). It seems to move like a jack-in-the-box might if one could hop about quickly. He is so ugly, the soundtrack so disquieting and the camera so close to his head that when he speaks he seems frightening. He makes gibberish sounds. There is no recognizable dialogue in the film. This is the beginning of a memorable sequence in which the colors seem more vivid and alive than in images of the artist in his present state. It may be the memory of a great moment for the artist, but for us it is as disturbing as it is fascinating.
When Release Print asked me to interview Gibbons, I began by asking what attracted him to Kafka's short story. I was surprised to hear "It was a metaphor for something I was seeing reflected in my own life and in the lives of other sculptors and painters I knew who were dedicated to art forms that were being phased out. At Danger Productions the show (Bump in the Night) was shut down and the excuses I was hearing over and over were 'nobody really understands stop-motion' and 'it is too expensive.' After having worked in the computer world I realize that was a total fallacy. Doing any kind of a production on a computer is prohibitively expensive. I came to understand that the reason stop-motion was being phased out and computers were being phased in was the technology. The bells and whistles of computers were a flashier way of doing something."
"I was also attracted to this romantic and oddly futile character. The artist, against all odds and better judgment refuses to abandon his craft/art. I don't think of him as a hero and yet some crazy instinct or corner of myself does. There is ironic humor to the idea that the starving artist was flipped into an artist that starves."
When asked about his knowledge of German Expressionism he had little to say. He had seen clips from The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and from a few other classic films, but "I don't really know where the German Expressionist stuff came from. I was looking at a lot of Atget photos of Paris at the time I was designing the "city" stage. I like that look of German Expressionism, but I don't know how deliberate it was to emulate it in the film. The film kind of dictated the style that I ended up doing it in." He became aware of German Expressionist painters, illustrators and printmakers in the 1980's when he was working as an illustrator.
I was fascinated to learn his combination of 2D and 3D characters, "developed from an aesthetic and from a budgetary kind of thing. I actually couldn't afford to build all the 3D puppets that I would have liked to have built, so I had to come up with alternative ways of making puppets... When I was initially thinking about the piece aesthetically the film was all about the hunger artist. He was the main focus and in a way the outside world was subordinate to his belief in himself and his art form. I had used 2D puppets before in films, but I had to take it to the next level and build them so they could walk around in a 3D world.
We had a long discussion about adopting a work from another medium. He began by saying that if he ever met Kafka in the afterlife he hoped he wouldn't kick him in the butt. "When I read a story that is a perfect piece in and of itself, to make a movie that duplicates it is a redundancy. In The Hunger Artist I didn't take a lot of the story contextually and use it in the film. I hope that doesn't wreck it for Kafka lovers." He modestly says he hopes his version isn't embarrassing to the original piece - it isn't.
Gibbons told me in 1997, just after the film was funded, that he expected to complete it in the following year. Instead it was in production for 1.5 years and in post for 3.
Although the film was designed and animated by Gibbon, he needed assistance on other parts of the production. The fine soundtrack is by Blaise Smith, a partner in Hank Smith Music in S.F. and the sound design was created by Joaby Deal at One Union Recording, S.F. Tippett Films, where he has worked for several years, donated computer time so he could do scratch removal on 2 shots (a lab mistake) and 8 special effect shots. Tippett staff members donated the labor needed. The cgi work took 1? years as it was nearly impossible to match the colors and contrast of the cgi work with the 16mm footage. The contrast and colors kept changing when images were transferred back from cgi to 35mm and then reduced to 16mm.
The filmmaker also had help building rock solid armatures for his 3D figures. A second grant was needed to complete the project as the original plans for it to be under 10 minutes were revised. It ended up being 16 minutes long. The completion grant came from FAF and was sponsored by Dockers.
The Hunger Artist premiered at the Deep Ellum Film Festival in Dallas, the city in which he grew up. It won first place in the animation category. It was just shown at Slamdance where it won the audience award for best short. On February 2 and 5 it will be shown at the Roxie as part of the San Francisco Independent Film Festival. It will be in their "Animation Extravaganza." It plays in L.A. at the Egyptian Theater on March 27 in a program of the Best of Slamdance. Gibbons will be entering it in a lot more festivals.
When asked how the late Ken Willard might have reacted to his friend and colleague getting a grant in his name, he said Ken would have told him to go spend the money on a big keg party. He added that he hoped Ken would have been pleased as they had talked about the questionable future of stop-motion and the fickle nature of Hollywood.
Gibbons also reminded me of something I said when he was awarded The Ken Willard Award, that FAF should be proud that they are supporting a true art film and that grants that support film as a great art form are rare. I doubt that The Hunger Artist would have been made without FAF's help. For images and more information about the film visit www.downtimefilms.com
Ken Willard, who was well known and liked by a lot of people in the Bay Area animation world, died Sept. 21, 1995. At the time of his death he was working at Pixar as a computer animator on Toy Story. His passing is mentioned in the credits of that feature. He died of an aneurysm or complications from an operation to correct one. He was 36.
According to Glenn McQueen, supervising animator, the increase in computing power allows "you to get more visual complexity on the screen. More stuff, more atmosphere, more characters, more clothing, more everything." This can make scenes more complicated to animate and keeping track of all that detail can become a problem.
McQueen is a big fan of their new simulation software. It allowed the animators to spend more time on the performance of their characters. "That's where I want to see our animators spending their time. It was a terrific improvement." In Toy Story 2 Al's shirt and pants had to be moved by hand. "I hate animating things like that. You have to spend a lot of time on it and if it is done correctly no one will ever look at it. It doesn't help the film develop the story or provide entertainment. Having a computer do that grunt work is a great improvement."
Strangely, they preferred to animate one hair element by hand. The only human in the film is the little girl who invades the world of the monsters. She has a ponytail. It was easy to animate by hand as the movements were similar to animating the antenna on ants, "something we all have had a lot of practice doing." (Pixar created A Bug's Life)
The studio created a "tentacle package" in case they were going to animate a character with lots of arms or legs. At one time Sully had 8 tentacles. McQueen said 8 tentacles would have been very difficult to animate within the production schedule planned for the film. "It said monster loud and clear, but I gave a sigh of relief when the director and art directors decided to go with a two legged character. It made getting the film done on time more realistic."
The tentacle package was used on minor characters. Since there is little scientific evidence about what monsters look like, some of Pixar's creatures have multiple eyes, arms and legs. Many of them are extras designed to be built quickly and then moved by the new system. "They don't talk, but are great background characters as they have strong silhouettes. They are quick and easy to pose."
One monster that stands out from the others moves like a crab. A zoologist was consulted about crab locomotion systems since it is quite different than the walk cycles most animators are used to drawing. McQueen said that none of the monsters were based on recognizable animals. Why should they be familiar looking when there are so many "tantalizing ideas" of what the characters could be.
A typical day for McQueen and his staff of approximately 50 animators began at 8 or 8:30 with 1 1/2 to 2 hours of dailies. At these sessions they critique work currently in production. Everyone is free to participate in these discussions. Another purpose of the dailies is to make sure everyone is animating the same character the same way. Pixar does have lead animators who concentrate on getting great performances out of a character (John Kahrs on Sulley, Andrew Gordon on Mike and Tasha Wedeen and Dave DeVan on Boo), but there are scenes that were animated by others.
After dailies McQueen's day included meeting with individual animators, going over production schedules and working with the technical departments. The model and prop departments were building new props and characters right up to the end of the show. The model department has to constantly test their work to make sure it functions properly before it is turned over to the animators.
To keep the staff of Pixar up-to-date when new proprietary software is developed, they hold classes at Pixar University (good old PU). The school also teaches the basics for new staff members and offers other classes when people are not working on a production. McQueen says, "It behooves us to make sure everyone is as flexible as possible."
Glenn McQueen has started work on "John's next film" as animation supervisor. Lee Unkrich will be a co-director of that feature. Unkrich hinted that it is about something Lasseter has a passion for, just as his love for toys resulted in Toy Story. He didn't elaborate, but he did say "you can look forward to another great film." Pixar's next release will be Finding Nemo, (summer, 2003 release). Andrew Stanton is the director. Also in development is an untitled project being directed by Brad Bird. Bird directed the critically acclaimed Iron Giant for Warner Bros., a remarkable film with a strong peace message.
SAN FRANCISCO STATE'S CINEMA DEPT. SEEKS AN ASSISTANT PROFESSOR IN ANIMATION It isn't official yet, but the cinema department is getting ready to announce this full-time tenure-track position. I was told candidates should have a MFA or equivalent, teaching experience on the university level, a body of independent work and knowledge of traditional and computer techniques. They seek "an artist with personal vision." Apply by March 18, 2002. Send resume, 3 references to contact or 3 letter from references, a statement of your philosophy of animation teaching and sample reel to Patricia Amlin, Animation Search Committee, Cinema Dept. San Francisco State University, 1600 Holloway, SF, CA 94132 For information amlin@sfsu.edu
BRAINWASH MOVIE FESTIVAL DEADLINE IS MAY 1 AND 10 ($20/$30 late for shorts under 13 minutes, features $50/75 late fee). Previews on ?" tape, they do screen 16mm. This is a local grass roots event held in funky places and they show almost every entry submitted. Past prizes have included modified sports trophies. For details call Shelby Toland (aka David Krzysik) (415) 273-1545 PO Box 32302 Oakland 94623 shelby@brainwashm.com
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This issue was written by Karl Cohen. Pete Davis proof read the copy. Shirley Smith and Ron Seawright were on the mailing crew. Membership is $22 a year from the above address ($44 for local and international membership). |
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