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Director: Eric Goldberg
Date: 1974
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Good Old Fashioned Cartoon Violence’ is another gag cartoon made by top animator Eric Goldberg when he was still in his teens.
In this black and white cartoon a cartoon figure watches a Tom & Jerry like violent cartoon on television. Immediately after that, cartoon violence starts happening to him, too. It only ends when the poor guy shoots his creator (a nice self caricature of Goldberg).
This is not really a funny or good cartoon, but Eric Goldberg’s talent is unmistakable.
‘Good Old Fashioned Cartoon Violence’ is available on the DVD ‘Giants’ First Steps’
Director: Eric Goldberg
Date: 1973
Rating: ★★★
Review:
Legendary animator Eric Goldberg made this film when he was only 17 or 18. ‘For Sale’ is a short gag cartoon in which a man pursuits a background which can change into every scenery by snapping one’s fingers.
The main characters are designed with interesting open lines, and Goldberg already demonstrates his skills as an animator. Even the timing is rather good.
‘For Sale’ is available on the DVD ‘Giants’ First Steps’
Director: Nick Park
Date: 1978
Rating: ★★★
Review:
The interesting aspect of the DVD ‘Giants’ First Steps’ is that it shows well known animators and animation directors were not always that good. They had to start somewhere, and their early films show where they already succeeded and where they faltered.
With the charcoal animation of ‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ (made at the Sheffield Art School) Nick Park returns to the very origin of animation, with its earliest films using a blackboard. Nick Park retells the classic fairy tale in an original, stream of consciousness-like manner, with a lot of metamorphosis and weird sound effects.
Even though Park’s animation is crude, the film is pleasantly odd and original throughout. For example, Jack shoots a cow from the sky, and puts in a vending machine to obtain his magic bean, which turns out to be huge. My favorite part is a little guy talking gibberish into a microphone before the titles appear.
Park, of course, would later become world famous with his ‘Creature Comforts’ and Wallace and Gromit films, made at Aardman.
‘Jack and the Beanstalk’ is available on the DVD ‘Giants’ First Steps’
Director: Paul Driessen
Release date: 1974
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Cat’s Cradle’ is an early film by Dutch animator Paul Driessen for the National Film Board of Canada.
This is one of Driessen’s most enigmatic films, in which the images seem to flow in a stream-of-consciousness-like fashion, bridged by a string spun by tiny spider. Somehow the tale, if there is one, has a retrograde character, but it’s hard to make head or tail of Driessen’s narrative in this short.
The background art again is very limited and made of monochromes, and Driessen’s typical morbid humor is very present. For example, the spider is handled by a man, who in turn turns out to hang at a gallows pole.
Watch ‘Cat’s Cradle’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Cat’s Cradle’ is available on the DVD ‘Des histoires pas comme les autres’
Director: Zofia Oraczewska
Release date: 1976
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Banquet’ a bunch of waiters and chefs are preparing a huge banquet for a large number of guests. But when the guests arrive, the banquet turns out to be very different than expected.
‘Banquet’ has a mixed design: the waiters and chefs are rather classic cartoony figures, while the meals and the guests are collages partly made out of photo material.
Jan Skorża’s cut-out animation is fair, if not outstanding, and the whole film is a little too empty to be memorable. I guess the Polish film makers were less in their game when trying an attempt at humor.
Watch ‘Banquet’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Banquet’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Animated Film’
Director: Zbginiew Rybczyński
Release date: 1974
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Soup’ avant-garde film maker Zbigniew Rybczyński shows his fondness of repetitive use of live action material to create startling new images.
Rybczyński would perfect this technique in 1980 with the Academy Award winning short ‘Tango’, but ‘Soup’ already is intriguing and hard to describe. Rybczyński has tinted his source material in stark, contrasting colors, with reds, greens, yellows and blues really popping out of the screen.
The images show the daily routines of a married couple, until it is suggested that the man dies in a train crash. At that point the film burns down. The daily routines are strangely juxtaposed to each other, and there are some very odd touches, like a fork taking a bite out of cheek.
The alienating effect is greatly enhanced by the soundtrack. For sound designer Mieczysław Janik and composer Eugeniusz Rudnik have provided a highly disturbing score full of ordinary sounds amplified to a grotesque effect. For example, when the man brushes his teeth, this rather sounds like a fork scratching on a plate.
I don’t think ‘Soup’ is for everyone, but this intriguing film shows both Rybczyński’s unique approach to film making and the sheer creativity that Communist Poland was in the graphic arts in the 1960s and 1970s.
Watch ‘Soup’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Soup’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Animated Film’
Director: Mirosław Kijowicz
Release date: 1971
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘The Road’ is a simple little black and white film about a man walking a road, but then he faces a fork in the road.
According to IMDb this is a parable on how choices have consequences, and I can see something in that. Nevertheless the film may be a little too simple, making its message rather vague and puzzling. For example, we only see the man from the back, and only the second choice he has is clearly motivated, with help from a text balloon. Nevertheless, ‘The Road’ is a charming example of the experimental approach to animation in Poland.
Watch ‘The Road’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Road’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Animated Film’
Director: Phil Roman
Airing date: April 9, 1974
Stars: Charlie Brown, Linus, Lucy, Marcie, Peppermint Patty, Sally, Schroeder, Snoopy, Woodstock
Rating: ★★★
Review:
The twelfth Peanuts special was another holiday special, this time celebrating Easter. As with all Peanuts specials the story evolves at a leisurely speed, this time mixing ca. three stories into very short cross-cutting scenes.
The first and most entertaining story is about Peppermint Patty trying to teach Marcie how to paint eggs, but this goes haywire, because Marcie has absolutely no clue on how to prepare the eggs. The second story is about Snoopy buying a birdhouse for Woodstock, who initially shivers in the cold rain. Then there’s a story arc in which Linus tells the gospel of the Easter Bunny, just like he did on the Great Pumpkin.
Several scenes take place in a department store, and some of them are charming, if totally independent of the main story material, like Peppermint Patty, Marcie and Snoopy dancing to some Christmas-themed music boxes. This gives the episode a rather disjointed, almost improvisatory feel.
Vince Guaraldi’s soundtrack is great throughout, giving Snoopy and Woodstock an especially groovy soul-jazz theme, while the Easter Beagle is accompanied by a jazzy version of Beethoven’s seventh symphony.
Watch ‘It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown’ yourself and tell me what you think:
It’s the Easter Beagle, Charlie Brown’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Peanuts 1970’s Collection Vol. 1’
Director: Joško Marušić
Release date: 1979
Rating: ★★★
Review:
This dark and surreal film starts with fishing villagers saying goodbye to their men who go out fishing on the sea. But when they’re gone, the fish suddenly come to the shore…
‘Fisheye’ is animated very well and knows a sickly color palette with its pale yellows, greens and blues on a black canvas. There’s some great moving perspective animation of the fishing village. The film contains a grim atmosphere, but in the end is too one-dimensional to make a lasting impression. The abrupt and inconclusive ending doesn’t help.
Watch ‘Fisheye’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Fisheye’ is available on the DVD ‘The Best of Zagreb Film: Be Careful What You Wish For and The Classic Collection’
Director: Radivoje Gvozdanović
Release date: 1972
Rating: ★★★
Review:
This is a very short cartoon not clocking even one minute in which a man gets bunt at a stake. When the flames reach him he starts to pray…
This is a one gag cartoon that is over before you know it and a great example of the quirky humor that prevailed in the Zagreb Film studio.
Watch ‘Prayer’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Prayer’ is available on the DVD ‘The Best of Zagreb Film: Be Careful What You Wish For and The Classic Collection’
Director: Zlatko Grgić
Release date: 1971
Stars: Maxicat
Rating: ★★★
Review:
These are three very short episodes of the Maxicat series, which consisted of 24 episodes in total. These feature a very cartoony cat with a big nose experiencing Pink Panther-like adventures on a grey, featureless canvas.
In the first Maxicat finds a magical hat, in the second he eats spaghetti, and in the last he finds a flying broom. All three are short and classic gag cartoons with the dialogue-less action being accompanied by very jolly music. As these three episodes prove, Maxicat is an enjoyable series from the very creative Zagreb Film Studio from Yugoslavia.
Watch some Maxicat episodes yourself and tell me what you think:
These Maxicat episodes are available on the DVD ‘The Best of Zagreb Film: Be Careful What You Wish For and The Classic Collection’
Directors: Bill Melendez & Phil Roman
Airing date: November 20, 1973
Stars: Charlie Brown, Franklin, Linus, Lucy, Marcie, Peppermint Patty, Sally, Snoopy, Woodstock
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving’, the tenth of the Peanuts television specials, is the third of the Charlie Brown holiday specials, this time devoted to Thanksgiving. As such it’s a little preachy, especially through Linus’s lines.
The episode’s main problem is caused by Peppermint Patty when she invites herself, Marcie and Franklin over to Charlie Brown’s house, when he’s not even supposed to be home. Luckily, Linus, Snoopy and Woodstock help out.
The episode’s highlight is the silent comedy of Snoopy and Woodstock setting up a dinner table in the yard. This part is accompanied by a charming soul song devoted to the little yellow bird. Actually, the background music is very charming throughout most of the episode, with Vince Guaraldi lively piano trio music, joined by Tom Harrell on trumpet and Chuck Bennett on trombone. Only when Snoopy and Woodstock are putting on Thanksgiving costumes, this is exchanged for some ugly electronic music.
As always with the Peanuts films, the pace is relaxed. The animation is fair, if not outstanding, and the characters charming, and faithful to Schulz’s original comic strip.
Watch an excerpt from ‘A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Peanuts 1970’s Collection Vol. 1’
Director: Andrei Khrzhanovsky
Release date: 1973
Rating: ★★★
Review:
In ‘Butterfly’ a boy catches some butterflies, but after a nightmarish scene in which he himself is trapped, he releases them again.
The plot of ‘Butterfly’ is far from original, and rather predictive and boring, but Khrzhanovsky’s eclectic style is not. Part of the story is told in still oil paintings, but there’s also a little cell animation and cut-out animation.
The oil paintings are most interesting, with their rather high level of realism, and their painful contrast between colorful nature, and the dull, grey world of the modern city. Especially the scene inside the boy’s flat is most depressing, with only grey electronic robots to play with. Nevertheless, the most striking aspect of this film are not the animation nor the visuals, but the fascinating score by avant-garde composer Alfred Schnittke.
Watch ‘Butterfly’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Butterfly’ is available on the DVD ‘Masters of Russian Animation Volume 2’
Director: Ryszard Antoniszczak
Release date: 1974
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Farewell to Steam’ is a Polish children’s film set to a rock song. The short tells about a person who wants to become a train engineer.
This is one of those films from the early seventies that display a huge ‘Yellow Submarine’ influence. This short just breaths groovy seventies design. The man himself is a prototype of a seventies hippie.
The film uses full cell animation to show us images that are cartoony, surreal and weird. The images never cease to amaze, but a story is hardly present, and hard to follow anyway. In the end ‘Farewell to Steam’ succeeds more musically and visually than narratively.
Watch ‘Farewell to Steam’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Farewell to Steam’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Children’s Animation’
Director: Stefan Janik
Release date: 1972
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Enchanted Triangles’ is a cute children’s films from Poland about triangles. The film makes clever use of the imagination of children to transform triangles into church towers, mountains, pyramids, sailing boats, birds and butterflies.
Two boys explore this triangle world. The film uses a voice over by a girl and cut-out animation. The two boys are charmingly drawn in crayons in a semi-childish style, but the triangles remain abstract. The result is cute if unassuming and rather forgettable.
Watch ‘Enchanted Triangles’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Enchanted Triangles’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Anthology of Polish Children’s Animation’
Director: Bill Melendez
Airing date: March 11, 1973
Stars: Charlie Brown, Franklin, Linus, Lucy, Margie, Peppermint Patty, Sally, Snoopy
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘There’s No Time for Love, Charlie Brown ‘is the ninth Peanuts television special. This instalment is a nice, quiet little affair, with a rather stream-of-consciousness-like quality to it.
The special starts with several comic-based loose gags on school, most of them starring Sally and Peppermint Party. After seven minutes the main story kicks in, in which the kids have to go on a field trip to a museum and write a report on it. Unfortunately, Charlie Brown, Sally, Peppermint Patty and Marcie end up in a supermarket. What’s worse, Peppermint Patty hurts Charlie Brown’s feelings there, too.
Marcie, who makes her screen debut here, has a particularly young sounding voice (by one Jimmy Ahrens). It’s nice to watch her interaction with Peppermint Patty on screen, as is the interplay between Peppermint Patty and Charlie ‘Chuck’ Brown.
Halfway the supermarket scenes there’s a short song on Snoopy’s Joe Cool character, while the accompanying images show Snoopy imagining himself as a world famous grocery clerk. The rest of the episode features a very attractive jazz score by Vince Guaraldi. Throughout, both the animation and the facial expressions are fair, and the whole episode is a pleasant, if rather understated affair.
Watch ‘There’s No Time for Love, Charlie Brown’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘There’s No Time for Love, Charlie Brown’ is available on the DVD-set ‘Peanuts 1970’s Collection Vol. 1’
Director: Carlos Saldanha
Release date: December 10, 2017
Rating: ★★★
Review:
The classic children’s book ‘The Story of Ferdinand’ by writer Munro Leaf and illustrator Robert Lawson appeared in 1936, and already in 1938 Walt Disney turned, quite faithfully, the story into an animated short called ‘Ferdinand the Bull’.
Of course, for its twelfth feature length film the Blue Sky studio had to expand the story. Like in the book and like Disney’s film Ferdinand is a flower loving bull who refuses to fight, but who ends up in the arena, anyway. There the similarities stop. To this core the studio added a lot of characters and complications. In the process the book’s essentially pacifistic character has been replaced by a more generic message that being gentle, friendly, and helpful doesn’t mean that one is weak, on the contrary. Also added is that all-American dream that one can change the world oneself (“It does not have to be this way” one can hear repeatedly in the movie).
The studio transfers the story to present day Spain and adds a background story of young Ferdinand growing up in a place called ‘Casa del toro’. Young Ferdinand sees his father off into the arena, never to return. This prompts the peaceful calf to escape, and somewhere in the neighborhood of Ronda (the town’s famous Puente Nuevo can be seen in some of the background views from Ferdinand’s flower hill) Ferdinand is found and adopted by a girl called Nina and her father Juan, a flower farmer.
After thirteen minutes young Ferdinand turns into his adult counterpart, and he has grown into a big bull, indeed. When he ends up at ‘Casa del Toro’ again, Ferdinand has a hard time keeping his pacifist ideals, and even worse, he learns a terrible truth about bullfighting, prompting him to rescue his fellow casa inmates.
Woven into this story are a lot of extra characters, rather crowding the story. At Nina’s place there’s a dog called Paco (weakly voiced by Jerrod Carmichael), while ‘Casa del Toro’ features five other bulls, a female “calming” goat called Lupe (a nice voice job by Kate McKinnon), three German horses, and three hedgehogs, which are strange enough rendered in purples and blues. The three German horses add to the fun, but are hardly essential to the plot, and particularly the three hedgehogs come across as stock characters. These three drive a car in a scene that seems directly stolen from ‘Toy Story 2’ in which other small characters manage to drive together.
True, ‘Ferdinand’ is well told, and knows no dead moments. But it doesn’t hold any surprises, either, and the film feels frustratingly run-of-the-mill. Even the gags are disappointingly predictable. The chase scene in Madrid is inspired, but the all too sweet finale is a letdown: there’s absolutely no drama or conflict left in the end. Meanwhile, the charm of the original book gets completely lost in all the antics of Ferdinand’s co-stars, and the sometimes gross out humor (for example, Lupe repeatedly throws up things). It’s also worthwhile to mention that the film is less anti-bullfighting than one would hope.
The film also feels lackluster visually: there are no interesting character designs, and even some ugly ones (some of the humans, a problem troubling the studio since its first Ice Age movie). There is some stylization (for example the bark of the tree on Ferdinand’s hill, a cartoony bee and an almost mechanical butterfly), but this is not carried through consistently. The rendering, too, feels poor, especially when compared to the contemporary ‘Coco’, giving the characters a hard edge and all too saturated colors. The background art, too, is rather simple and uninspired. Even worse, some of the animation is shockingly stiff, especially that of Nina and Juan. On the upside, there are some nicely staged scenes, like Ferdinand entering the slaughterhouse, or Ferdinand entering the ring. In the latter scene, the camera swoops around Ferdinand while he walks into the arena, capturing both the overwhelming scenery and Ferdinand’s reaction to it.
In all ‘Ferdinand’ is not bad, but it’s no classic, either, as the film is as entertaining as it is forgettable.
Watch the trailer for ‘Ferdinand’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘Ferdinand’ is available on Blu-Ray and DVD
Directors: Bruno Chauffard & Glenn McCoy
Release date: December 5, 2017
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘The Secret Life of Kyle’ stars Gru’s monstrous dog from the ‘Despicable Me’ films.
In this short Gru’s dog, Kyle, has fallen in love with a neighboring poodle. When he discovers a rival Alsatian Kyle obtains a fancy collar for his love interest, but in the end he wins her over with the squeeky toy he carries around.
‘The Secret Life of Kyle’ is a nice, if forgettable short offering some swell silent comedy in the best cartoon tradition, but without adding anything to it.
Watch ‘The Secret Life of Kyle’ yourself and tell me what you think:
‘The Secret Life of Kyle’ is available on the Blu-Ray and DVD of ‘Despicable Me 3’
Director: Joel Crawford
Airing date: November 24, 2017
Rating: ★★★
Review:
I bought this DVD by mistake, mistaking it for ‘Trolls World Tour‘. Oh, well, I might as well watch and review it. ‘Trolls Holiday’ is a television special that features the characters from ‘Trolls’ (2016). The 30 minute short is a holiday special that, refreshingly, is not about Christmas.
The story is extraordinarily simple and straightforward: when Poppy discovers that the Bergens have no holiday left since the abolition of Trollstice, she decides to give them one of the trolls’ own numerous holidays. Unfortunately she gets so carried away she doesn’t realize she distresses her Bergen best friend Bridget during the show. Bridget asks Poppy to leave. Luckily soon Poppy realizes what she has done, while Bridget realizes what Poppy was trying to do. So in the end she invents a holiday of her own, ‘Troll-A-Bration’, celebrating their friendship.
‘Trolls Holiday’ is a nice if unnecessary addendum to the Trolls movie. Both Anna Kendrick and Justin Timberlake reprise their roles, and there’s a lot of singing, especially during Poppy’s presentation. The special ends with both Bergens and Trolls singing Madonna’s ‘Holiday’.
However, the most entertaining parts are the digital cut-out animation sequences telling the background story and Poppy’s plan. During the caterpillar bus ride the trolls shortly change into their real life versions, which is pretty distressing, as this only shows how infinitely more ugly the original toys were when compared to the fluffy versions of the film.
Watch the first four minutes of ‘Trolls Holiday’ and tell me what you think:
‘Trolls Holiday’ is available on DVD
Director: Brian Fee
Release date: March 28, 2017
Rating: ★★★
Review:
‘Cars’ was the first Pixar film after Toy Story to get a sequel in 2011. Unfortunately, ‘Cars 2’ was as much as a digression from the original narrative as it was disappointing. With ‘Cars 3’ the studio returned to the original source material, once again focusing on Lightning McQueen.
The film takes a brave step in showing the effects of getting older and realizing that you’re not young anymore, and thus is a film more appealing to parents than to youngsters. The whole idea of characters getting older is a bold one in animation land, and the film does a good job in the depiction of passing the torch from one generation to a new one.
Unfortunately, Lightning McQueen never was a wholly sympathetic character, and he certainly isn’t in this film. When his reign on the racetrack is threatened by a new generation of rookies, he desperately tries to stay in place. But his reckless and selfish behavior leads to disaster, and when he’s offered a training program, he’s too impatient and too self-centered to follow the rules, wrecking some expensive equipment and putting his younger trainer into danger.
In fact, this trainer, the female car Cruz Ramirez (wonderfully voiced by Cristela Alonzo), by far is the most interesting character of the movie. She’s apparently from a humbler background and shows McQueen that some people must struggle hard to achieve the confidence and success he took for granted. But the film is not her story, and this important message is pushed aside by McQueen’s struggle with his own ageing and mortality.
In this, the film relies heavily on McQueen’s relation to his own mentor, Doc Hudson. This character was voiced by Paul Newman, who passed away in 2008, so his dialogue comes from unused recordings for the first film. This mentor-theme is pushed rather forcefully and heavy-handedly into the story, with a series of flashbacks in which McQueen realizes how he has mistreated Cruz as a low point of stating the obvious.
Moreover, for a large part the film blindly follows the rules of the sports film, with an unlikely outsider winning from the established and unsympathetic competitor thanks to an unconventional training scheme. This training part, under the auspices of Smokey, Doc Hudson’s former partner, is by far the weakest part of the film. This cliché path fills most of the second part of the film, hampering a story that could have been more daring and more original.
The characters from the first film are hardly present in ‘Cars 3’. Even Mater’s role is surprisingly modest, considering he was the leading character of ‘Cars 2’. Especially disappointing is the role of Sally, McQueen’s girlfriend. In fact, McQueen hardly behaves as if he were in a relationship, at all. There’s no conflict at all between him and Sally when he goes training at the other side of the continent, nor when he sees the younger woman Cruz more than he sees her. This somehow feels like a missed opportunity.
Meanwhile, the effect animation, the background art, the scene setting, and lighting are all of the highest quality. The world building of ‘Cars 3’ feels so effortless, one can focus on the characters and forget how well it is done. In fact, the character animation of the cars themselves remain the weakest element of the animation, as the car-living-being-combination remains a bit uncanny and unconvincing, with those large continuous eyes filling the front window, and those odd mouths in the bumper regions.
‘Cars 3’ pleasantly rounds up McQueen’s story, from an all too hasty rookie in ‘Cars’ to a veteran who realizes his days are over, but who manages to pass his knowledge to a new generation. I certainly hope Pixar does not make the same mistake as with ‘Toy Story’ and leaves the franchise with a perfect ending after three films.
Watch the trailer for ‘Cars 3’ yourself and tell me what you think:
Dr. Grob's Animation Review 