OBITUARIES

GIANTS PASS by Prescott Wright

In the last months, the world of animation has lost two of its most important proponents. One was Louise Beaudet, the Animation Archivist of La Cinematheque Quebecoise in Montreal, and the second was my friend and long time colleague Mr. Renzo Kinoshita, a founder and executive of the Hiroshima Animation Festival. These two were not giants in terms of their number of awards, nor were they well known in our world of animation, however, without them our world animation culture would be poorer.
Louise's outstanding contribution was her personal research, selection and archiving of one of the world's richest collection of almost lost and now precious animated films from the early years as well as outstanding examples of international independent and studio animated films. I am personally grateful for her support of the Ottawa International Animation Festival which I co-founded in the early and difficult days.
Louise is also respected world-wide for her nonpareil retrospective programs which put the Ottawa festival on the map as a serious international festival. Not only were her notations expertly researched and well written, but the prints she gathered from sources around the world were the very best. These were not just old tired prints with a few hackneyed notes, but comprehensive programs delineating the talents and the times of animators like Raoul Barre and Charles Bowers. In 1988, Mde. Beaudet gave us two outstanding programs celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Cinematheque with films like Ferdinand Zecca's Slippery Jim, 1909, and Witold Giersz thought lost film L'Incindie. The second hit of that festival was her program "Les Pioneers de L'Animation Allemande" with crisp prints of work by German animators Oskar Fischinger, Julius Pinchewer, Hans Richter and others. In my humble opinion, the greatest tribute to the world of Louise Beaudet would be to transfer these archival jewels to tape or laser disc for distribution to the animation schools around the world on the condition that all of the students watch them.
Louise was also a founder of ASIFA-Canada and a past-president of the group. The group honored her last year by dedicating an issue of their magazine to her. It was full of testimonials and stories about her. She was the honorary president of Ottawa '96 and they presented her the Norman McLaren Heritage Award.
Our second quiet giant who passed on was the Japanese animator Renzo Kinoshita. He was an imposing figure, looking much like an ancient Japanese Lord, strong, quiet and thoughtful. And, his films were like that. Though not a prodigious producer, Renzo's animated films were carefully and thoughtfully planned treating topics like the Americanization of Japan in Japon done with clever sociologically pointed humor,
and his Pica Don, showing the dropping of the atomic bomb on Hiroshima where now a biannual ASIFA International animation festival is held under the motto "Love and Peace." He was one of the few independent animators active in Japan and his work has influenced others to become animators.
Renzo Kinoshita's other formidable contribution to animation was his assistance to his wife Sayoko, who is the Director of the Hiroshima Festival. While I was at the Festival in 1990, I remember fondly that one night after the films, Renzo took a few of us downtown for "pizza." Well, their pizza was something quite apart from that found in San Francisco or Yonkers. It was more of a scrape-up-the-kitchen-crepe and it was delicious. We and Renzo had great laughs during our introduction to this popular semi-fast food. Somewhere below his quiet demeanor was a man who loved a good joke.
Renzo represented Japan for many years with the ASIFA-International Board of Directors. This is a job which requires great diplomacy and much patience, at which he was a master.
Those who knew these two giants of animation knew they were special people. They will be missed greatly.

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