ShortoftheWeek Reviews

Genesis Antipode (2006)

A Post Apocalyptic Awkward Feeler

[9/10 · 5 March 2008]

The post apocalyptic sub-genre is a particularly fitting one for short film. Figure: With almost everyone dead, there's not a whole lot going on. Most of the features taking place in these dim tomorrows could have their plots reduced to ten minutes. A majority of the run times are used up by guys in BDSM-gear driving dune buggies across ruined landscapes.

Genesis Antipode, produced, written, and directed by American J.R. Robinson in New Zealand, takes the post apocalyptic story to its character-driven basics. There's a man and a woman, and the rest of the world is dead. Too bad she despises him. Told in two timelines, the human race is no more when the film begins. Jeffrey and Rebecca stay close to each other, outside of the city for fear of what may lie there. They had met before the fall of civilization, on a blind date. He was her intellectual superior, but in every other way, he lagged behind. Rebecca, an attractive, social woman, was repulsed by his inability to grasp even basic cultural norms. However Jeffrey, a dweebish scientist, thought things had gone swimmingly. He learns otherwise, and then everyone else dies.

This is one of the most compelling visions of a destroyed world you'll find on film. It's not exciting, but with believable acting and a far too believable situation, it sticks in your brain. Genesis Antipode is both depressing and relaxing. Is there hope in its suggested future? That's up to you to decide. It presents two people in the most awkward of situations and lets the audience imagine what they would do in their place.

Father and Daughter (2000)

Poetry in Motion

[10/10 · 5 March 2008]

In 2000, Father and Daughter won the Academy Award for Best Short Film for its Dutch director Michael Dudok de Wit. For such a short (eight minutes) movie it has a remarkable capacity to move an audience. The story of a father who leaves his daughter and rows off into the ocean, it commences with two figures riding their bicycles, the smaller of the wheels in perfect symmetry with the larger. The father and daughter climb to the top of a hill at which point the father alights, hugs his daughter before climbing down to the seashore. He cannot resist running back and holding the girl one last time before rowing off towards the distant horizon. The girl runs up and down against the skyline as the sun gradually sets. There is no explanation. She returns again and again to her vantage point on the cliff to peer out to sea for his return. Each return marks a passage in her life from child to adolescent, mother and eventually old woman. And still she returns to search for the father who left her.

The landscape of the Netherlands with its wide skies and tall poplar trees is the backdrop to the movie. The sky and landscape is a delicate colour wash of brown, grey, sepia, sometimes hints of green or blue. The drawing is pencil and charcoal, the drawings scanned and colour added digitally. Remarkably in a film that deals in emotion, there is no facial detail whatsoever. Often the figures are drawn in silhouette. This can be remarkably effective in conveying mood: the old woman toiling up the hill, the flapping arms of the child, the teenager gliding down the slope on her bike, which in another later scene will simply not stand upright. Always the brushwork is spare, perhaps a stroke that transforms into a slender girl or a smudge for the squared old woman. Each shot is exquisite: the long shadows of trees or bicycle; seascape and sky, vast and empty. The seasons change with a rustle of leaves or the girl struggling up the hill against a wind that bends trees. The music by Norman Roger is sympathetic to the theme, essentially a lilting tune but arranged with tone and depth.

This astonishingly accomplished and poetic movie fulfils in every sense. Michael Dudok de Wit was born in 1953 and educated in Holland. In 1978, he graduated from the West Surrey College of Art in England. His films include Tom Sweep (1992), The Monk and the Fish (1994) and The Aroma of Tea (2006). You might also have seen the rather classy commercial for United Airlines, A Life. Given his draftsman-like qualities, Michael is much in demand as an illustrator for books. My Christmas present from my family, and well recommended, was Best of British Animation Awards Vol.4 that includes Michael's Oscar winning short.

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The Pearce Sisters (2007)

A Bleak Tale of Loneliness and Tea

[10/10 · 5 March 2008]

In the words of its makers, The Pearce Sisters—a short film based on the story by Mick Jackson and produced by Aardman Animations—is "a bleak hearted tale of love, loneliness, guts, gore, nudity, violence, smoking and cups of tea." And you know how well tea parties and loneliness mix. Enter the sisters, Lol and Edna Pearce.

Living "a miserable existence on a remote and austere strip of coast", the two old spinsters are eager to find company, with the complicity of the sea. Possibly male—handsome— grateful? Though they'd hardly win the heart of any living man, The Pearce Sisters won Best Short Animation at the 2008 BAFTA Awards.

Director Luis Cook has been at Aardman Animations since 1994, but this is his first (second, if you count the title sequence for the London Film Festival) non-commercial work. At a time when beauty often seems less exploratory, and more of a formula, it's refreshing to see a film dive into the aesthetics of ugliness. With every detail in every scene transporting us into this parallel universe born from Luis Cook's mind—a world both austere and humorous at the same time. As my friend Mike appropriately asked, "If the sisters had only gotten a bikini wax… would things have turned out different?"

One can only guess.

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Mermaid (1997)

Hard to Follow But Darn Pretty

[9/10 · 4 March 2008]

The narrative in Mermaid is somewhat muddled. The old monk has what must be considered a flashback 1/4 of the way through the film and then a dream 3/4 through, and frankly I'm a bit at a loss to try to explain either. Generally Petrov's storytelling is considered somewhat pedantic, despite or perhaps because he works entirely with literary adaptations, necessitating sometimes difficult omissions. Yet it's his art that he is famous for, and that is firmly on display in Mermaid. He is the most accomplished practitioner of a unique medium —he animates using oil paint on glass, using 2-to 3 layers to add depth to the images, animating new plates as the finished ones dry. It is a meticulous, yet beautiful technique that has won him much acclaim—3 previous Oscar nominations, including the win in 1999 for his adaptation of Hemingway's Old Man and the Sea. That film was a huge technical step forward as he adapted his style to the unforgiving IMAX format with the help of the Canadian production house Pascal Blais.

While Mermaid did not win, it likewise was nominated for the Oscar in 1996. Mermaid is in some ways the perfection of Petrov's original technique before money, improved technology, and production teams lead to Old Man and the Sea and My Love. Indeed it was the success of Mermaid that enabled Petrov to receive the kind of corporate patronage that allowed those films to happen.

Terminus (I) (2007)

Dark & Beautiful

[9/10 · 22 January 2008]

Terminus (Latin for "boundary stone") is a dark comedy about the self-destructive nature of the human mind and the dangers of urban isolation. In this film, a colossus made of concrete pilings follows a lonely man throughout the city tormenting him as he goes about his daily life on the subway, at the doctor's office, and elsewhere. All the while, a strong, foreboding sense of mental anxiety builds as the man is ultimately driven to extreme ends.

I caught up with Trevor (a Canadian filmmaker and recipient of many visual effects distinctions including 2 Emmy nominations) to ask him some questions about the film…

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Birdhouses (2004)

A Beautiful Story, Touching Performances

[9/10 · 13 January 2008]

When I was a young boy, I would gather every Saturday evening around the television for our weekly family tradition of watching "Hee Haw," an hour of country music, down home silliness and simple family fun.

As I grew up, my musical tastes moved more toward The Ramones and The Dead Kennedys and, sadly, family time became less and less of a priority. Birdhouses, a 2004 short film written and directed by Sam Goetz, brings to mind those sweet, tender and funny days when family time mattered and courtship still took place over homemade berry pies and reruns of "Hee-Haw" and "Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C."

The story of Dave (David Barlett) and Louise (Nina Louise Miller), Birdhouses is a funny and gentle-hearted romantic short that follows these two lonely souls who unexpectedly connect after Nina moves into the neighborhood and, being the neighborly sort, brings a homemade pie over to David as a sort of introduction.

What follows is a basic story made incredibly beautiful by the touching performances of Bartlett and Miller, blended together with surprisingly effective clips of Buck Owens, Roy Clark, Lulu and the rest of the oddly endearing "Hee-Haw" gang. So easily, the characters in Birdhouses could have been turned into a Southern caricature, but Goetz's wonderful dialogue finds the inherent humor in the scenes without ever making fun of the characters.

Shot on an estimated $3,500 budget, Birdhouses is carried by the strength of the lead performances and Jonathan Yi's mood-setting black and white camera work. The film won "Best Short Film" at the Ithaca Film Festival and Idaho's Spudfest and is now available as a free rental at Jaman.com.

Ah, L'Amour (1995)

Painfully Honest, The Beginnings of a Brilliant Filmmaker

[10/10 · 13 January 2008]

This gut-busting yet painfully honest animation showcases the horrific encounters of a genuine man's quest to find love. His honest attempts to make friendly conversation with each encounter are ill-received, each woman bringing the attempt to a different brutally violent end. The common thread from commenters describe the film as, "both funny and true".

Ah L'Amour was Don's first minor splash in the world of animation. Created while a student at UC Santa Barbara, Ah L'Amour was never intended for a wide viewing audience. Still, you see his personal style of bringing brutal realism to the simple and mundane moments of life —the Scorsese of animation—that shows itself in his later films, Rejected and Everything Will Be OK (both nominated for Oscars). Using extremely simplified scenes and characters (stick figures), his honest sense of storytelling is able to shine. Of all the animator's I've come to know, he is the only one who can bring 3 simple lines to life in ways that a whole crew of 3D animators could only dream of.

Don Hertzfeldt (Bitter Films) is certainly no newcomer to the animation scene. Those familiar with Don's animation methods will know that he challenges himself to using only traditional animation methods abstaining from any digital intervention. In fact, he would have been featured on Short of the Week long ago had he endorsed any official online posting of his films. Ah L'Amour is his first. Let's hope there's more to come.

Mindscape (1976)

The Surreal Meets Pinscreen Animation

[9/10 · 13 January 2008]

Le Paysagiste/Mindscape— a surreal and breathtaking experimental short film, available for viewing thanks to the National Film Board of Canada's Focus on Animation.

The NFB Focus on Animation site is wonderful for its educational content as well as its film collection, with a superb series of articles documenting key techniques, films and filmmakers in the history of animation. Le Paysagiste is a perfect representative of what the NFB site has to offer. Created in 1976 using an obscure technique known as pinscreen animation, Le Paysagiste is considered by many the crowning achievement of the rare, but beautiful form. Instead of simply hosting the film, the sites supplementary articles represent some of the best resources for information about both pinscreen animation and the filmmaker.

At its essence, pinscreen works through shadow. A screen is poked through with groups of "pins" that can be moved in and out, and then is lit from the side. When sticking out, the pins cast a long shadow, which creates black on the screen. When pushed in, they cause no shadow and create white. Intermediate distances create different lengths of shadow and white, allowing for a whole scale of gray.

The results are what you see in Le Paysagiste, a beautiful tapestry that looks like charcoal sketches put in motion. Drouin exploits this impressionistic form in order to create a stream of conscious tour through the mind of an artist. In the film an artist is painting a lovely landscape when he finds himself able to step into the picture. Entering into this foreign world that is in fact his own, he begins a tour of psychological symbolism and random association, as objects and settings twist and morph around him.

The fleeting, transitory nature of the images bellies the intense and meticulous work needed to create them. Pinscreen is a very labor-intensive technique, which is a big reason for why it has been virtually abandoned as an art. The NFB's Focus on Animation site though reclaims and highlights historically vital works such as Le Paysagiste, making it a great resource for animation lovers.

Read this and other reviews of online short films at ShortoftheWeek.com

Balance (1989)

A Stunning Work from Germany's Communist Collapse

[10/10 · 9 December 2007]

A platform floats in a neutral space. Strange men, identical except for the numbers on their back, appearing as though out of some dystopian future, must work in concert to prevent the platform from tipping. The emergence of a strange box, a new development in this closed and sterile space, disrupts the tedium but also the teamwork, as each man wants to individually inspect and enjoy the box—threatening them all as the platform becomes increasingly unbalanced.

Add though a context. A time and place to the film's creation. Germany, 1989. The fact that the men are identical but for their numbers, is this not a oft-used symbol for the anonymity desired of those in a Communist society? That they are all the same and thus interchangeable? The cooperation they display at first is perhaps indicative of Socialism, and the box, what is the meaning of the music it plays, the dancing it inspired? Radio Free Europe used to broadcast American music, such as the jazz heard coming out of the box, into Communist countries throughout the Cold War. Perhaps the box is a symbol of possibility, of what is outside the closed system, which inevitably undermines said system.

And so a parable about selfishness becomes an allegory about German society and Soviet Communism at its fall. The sad and ironic ending of Balance, who is at fault? The men that fail to do what is best for them? Or the system that fails to acknowledge this human quality?

Read the full review at ShortoftheWeek.com

Learn Self Defense (2005)

A Simple, Humorous Satire

[9/10 · 16 October 2007]

This instructional film places our average Joe deep into a satire on modern foreign politics. When diplomacy fails (or is neglected), it's time to fight. And as mathematics has proved, it's always helpful to have God on your side. All you need now is an over-sized cowboy hat and a jumbo pistol. Watch it.

The big strength in Learn Self Defense is in its simple character illustration and minimal animation. Everything from movement to color to sound has been minimized to focus your concentration on the tiniest change.

Chris Harding is a very talented animator who doesn't take himself too seriously. He is cautiously documenting his secret Mystery Work In Progress (working title) for all to follow.

Fourteen (2006)

A Film of Small and Big Moments

[9/10 · 16 October 2007]

A young girl somewhere in middle America turns 14 and her life is poised for a momentous change. The camera follows her on that fateful morning as she and her family prepare themselves for the new beginning ahead. That description may seem somewhat lacking, but it can be hard to write a blurb for something like Fourteen a film with no dialogue and a twist ending. What is there to say that doesn't give too much away?

Let me instead attest to its quality rather than its plot. Showcased at numerous film festivals in 2006, (I caught it at Seattle International, but it played SXSW, AFI, Sundance and others) Fourteen is a film of small moments; care is given to each shot, depicting with tenderness seemingly unimportant activities such as an apron being tied, or the young girl's hair being done up, but the shots are linked with such pacing and lyricism that they never fail to keep one's attention transfixed through to the unsettling end. A beautiful score and excellent cinematography further highlight a truly accomplished effort both technically and artistically from director Nicole Barnette.

Alive in Joburg (2005)

Impressive Dramatic, Documentary-Style, Sci-Fi Thriller

[9/10 · 16 October 2007]

This impressive short takes a documentary form, but it's definitely no Christopher Guest style mockumentary. Instead it's got aliens—really realistic looking ones, with mech-style "bio-suits". Set in an imaginary South Africa where aliens have landed and taken up residence, Alive in Joburg poses as a documentary intent on examining how life has changed for residents there, interchanging interviews with realistic CG. The visuals are excellent and while the film's attempt to equate the aliens reception by locals with South Africa's Apartheid era are somewhat transparent, any attempt at social metaphor earns kudos from me.

The director, Neill Blomkamp, is celebrated for his advertising work, and won for himself— based largely on this short I would presume—the directing gig for the new Halo film. I must say, based on this film, it looks like a truly inspired choice.

Check out all of our weekly reviews at ShortoftheWeek.com

She and Her Cat: Their Standing Points (1999 Video)

A Force to be Reckoned With

[9/10 · 16 October 2007]

Makoto Shinkai is a force to be reckoned with. The buzz surrounding his 2002 film Hoshi No Koe, (available on domestic DVD as Voices of a Distant Star) catapulted him to fame in his native Japan, eliciting hyperbolic claims of him being the "next Miyazaki" That film, a 30min mix of 2-D and 3-D animation was as celebrated for its novelty as much as anything else—it was created by Shinkai entirely at home on his Macintosh—but his followup, the beautiful feature film The Place We Were Promised In Our Early Days, demonstrated beyond a shadow of a doubt the skills of an animator with a beautiful visual sense.

This short, Kanojo to Kanojo no Neko (She and Her Cat ) is an early work by Shinkai, done in 1999. A charming monochrome piece, the story relates the relationship between a young Japanese woman and her cat, told from the perspective of the cat.

Pretty and endearing, the film is also an excellent primer on a number of common anime stylistic techniques—mundane objects slowly panned and artistically framed, ellipses of black, and on-screen text, serve to balance the whimsicality of a woman and cat love story with an almost nostalgic sadness.

**Check out all our weekly reviews at ShortoftheWeek.com

Rabbit (I) (2005)

An Old Tale Told Anew

[8/10 · 16 October 2007]

This strange short story tells an old tale in a new way. Two ambitious, young children chase down a rabbit and find a small idol hidden inside. This idol has the odd power of turning insects into jewels. Soon, the two kids hatch up a plan to make an operation of it—killing animals to attract flies that are then transformed into more jewels. Connections to our consumer culture can be readily drawn.

Animated from a set of 1950s stickers meant to teach kid's how to read, Rabbit reads like a children's book brought to life in 3D. In combination, the horrific storyline and the innocent imagery creates a sense of twisted unease that has no equal.

Run Wrake is a seasoned animator/illustrator with a bizarre taste in the grotesqueness of pop culture. His website is chock full of more film pieces and probably the best illustrated biography page I've seen.

** Check out all our weekly reviews at ShortoftheWeek.com

Hello (I) (2003)

An Endearing Animation About the Struggles of Love

[10/10 · 16 October 2007]

An endearing animation about the struggles of love and self-expression. Hello's characters are created from common audio devices—forced to communicate with what technology they have. A bumbling, young cassette player fumbles with his tape deck as he hopelessly attempts to capture the attention of the cute, digital girl next door. His earnest persistence won me over.

The animation technique integrates traditional, hand-drawn 2D characters and textures in a 3D environment through a process referred to as 2.5D. Although coarsely integrated at times, the visuals do their job of telling the story without becoming a distraction.

This festival hit is Jonathon Nix's first short animated film. The Australian animator is currently developing the prequel—a feature-length animation titled The Missing Key. Hello was my personal favorite from the Animation Show 2 (2005), and I'm pleased to see it now find a home online.

Check out all our weekly reviews at ShortoftheWeek.com