Sundance on Saturday... More of the Same

Before I knew it, it was nearly time for Mel, Kurt, and I to head up to Park City to catch one of my annual favorites at Sundance, the Animation Program. We managed to score a parking space right next to the Eccles, avoiding the need for the Festival shuttles, which are most effective getting the Fest goer from one venue to the next without moving vehicles or crowding the streets already packed with weekend skiers and tourists. Sundance's Animation Spotlight usually features a number of short animations, of many different techniques, some done by students, but most done by professional animators from around the World. It was at this program that I met Don Hertzfeldt ("Billy's Balloon", "Rejected", "Everything Will Be OK") 3 years ago.

This year's program featured 9 films of various media, many utilizing a number of animation techniques. The technologies and techniques were amazing, but unfortunately the storylines were mostly lacking the normal Sundance flare. It would seem that the animation programmers were impressed with fluff and not with "stuff" (stories with meaning and conclusion). The program started with a fantastically created "Madame Tutli Putli", done mostly with models and puppets. The sets were amazingly elaborate, and the animation flawless, but in the end, nobody knew what the story was. Carson Mell's "Chonto" was a vibrantly colored computer animation, where they cleverly pasted moving human lips overlaying the drawings to create the speaking of each character. We folow the recollections of a music star as he seeks the ultimate pet: a monkey named Chonto. 15 minutes in length, it drug on and the audience began to lose interest.

Joe Tucker's "For the Love of God" was an interesting tale of a momma's boy seeking the ultimate pleasure (in his miind): to have sex with God. Another fine example of stop motion model animation, this animation was amusing and actually was complete in story. Elaborate sets and movement were most impressive. "Yours Truly", Osbert Parker's multi-media extravaganza was an interesting use of cut-outs, images from classic films, and stop-motion brilliance. The story reveals a bank robber who scores the "big one", only to be betrayed by his signicant other, who proceeds to cut him up, cook him down, and hide the evidence from the cops. One of the main problems with this short was the overly-amplified audio, which had us plugging our ears with our fingers. I enjoyed the technique, using the stop motion modeling, combined with the use of clips from classic films to depict the faces and movement of the featured characters. If I was scoring on technique, it would be among the best I've seen.

Hermann Karlsson's "Dog", from Iceland, was simple, but ever so effective. A story with a beginning and end, and also a moral: your dog would NEVER let you down, and yet we take them for granted. Juan Pablo Zaramella's "Lapsus" was an adorable black and white short, featuring simplistic drawings (similar to Hertzfeldt's line drawings). It was clever and fun, and enjoyed by the entire audience. I wanted to see it again. "The Pearce Sisters" was Luis Cook's dark animation done with drawings, telling the tale of two sisters living by the sea, their lives filled with boredom: fishing the seas, smoking their catch, and smoking and preserving anything coming their way, including sailors or bodies washed up on shore. It was clever, but certainly not a major impact in my mind.

Sadly, I can't remember much of Peque Verela's "1977", but suffice it to say... it did not impress me. The final short, MK12's "The History of America", was somewhat clever but WAY too long at 31 minutes, and we actually left before it ended, as it just began to drag on. The utilization of multiple techniques was impressive, with a combination of drawings and digitized moving picture, done in a clever hand-traced, hand-colored technique. This was the story of cowboys vs. Astronauts/ Space People, whose final battle took place in Las Vegas. Againa a little less volume would have helped the audience's appreciation for this cleverly created film, complete with a mockumentary-type British live-action narrator, doing his best PBS commentary while sipping lime green cough syrup. I would consider a few of these films for SouthSide, but again I really think they lacked a storyline. It seems that the youth movement is more interested in shitty stimuli than in story with substance. I guess it's just an effect of our video-crazed, action-filled youth movement. Give me a good Bugs Bunny film, laced with political commentary and double meaning, and I'm a happy lad! Screw the technique. Bottom line, the audience favorites were the less-produced simple shorts, complete with simplistic drawings and brief statements.

We headed back home just in time to run off to an evening Filmaker reception in Salt Lake. More later...

In the meantime... butter up the popcorn, turn down the lights, and crank up that projector. The evening's show is about to begin.