With the close of Sundance and Slamdance this past weekend, animated shorts snatched up coveted prizes at the Park City, Utah events.
At Sundance, where animated and live-action shorts compete against each other, Adam Parrish King's animated, THE WRATH OF COBBLE HILL, tied with Carter Smith's live-action BUGCRUSH for the animated jury prize for shorts.
HILL, an animated coming-of-age fable set on the streets of Brooklyn, made its world premiere at Sundance. Crafted over the course of six years by writer/director King, the stop-motion film was originally conceived as a student film at USC. King designed and hand-crafted every character and set piece in the film from clay from the original comic books, liquor bottles and branded TV dinners that line the store shelves to the threadbare furniture of the characters' crumbling apartments. The short features original music from composer Steven Gutheinz.
WRAITH tells the story of Felix, a disaffected teenager whose deadbeat mom leaves him to fend for himself. To satisfy his basic needs, Felix pilfers candy bars and TV dinners from the corner deli, all under the seemingly unsuspecting noses of Mr. H, the kindly store owner, and his dog, Mitzie. Then, planning his holiday departure, Mr. H asks Felix to watch over the store and care for Mitzie. When Felix accepts, he faces a choice reciprocate the benevolence Mr. H has always shown him, or perpetuate the cycle of neglect he's been handed down as a family legacy.
The shorts jury included Georgia Lee, Sydney Neter and John Vanco.
Slamdance, which has a separate category for animated and live-action shorts, honored Troy Morgan's DRAGON as the best animated short.
DRAGON is stop-motion fable about an orphaned girl's ability to bring the darkest visions of her subconscious to life simply by drawing them. When her miserly ward attempts to exploit this unique gift for profit, the girl unleashes the malevolent title creature of her nightmares for revenge.
Rick DeMott
Animation World Network
Creator of Rick's Flicks Picks
