Animation Techniques: The Mascot

Polish writer/director/cinematographer Wladyslaw Starewicz was a master of puppetry and stop-motion animation. Even following his immigration from the Russian Empire to France as a white émigré in 1920, Starewicz continued to make many short films featuring bizarre-turned-beloved characters including everything from insects and taxidermied animals to cutlery and bits of rubbish. Both his imagination and his storytelling abilities rivaled that of Walt Disney, and it is argued that his articulation techniques have surpassed those of anyone else's before or since. Oddly, however, Starewicz is not very well-known. I myself only happened across a couple of his creations during a concert held by The Hot Club of San Francisco wherein they featured Cinema Vivant. The gypsy jazz band provided musical accompaniment to several black & white silent films, two of which—The Revenge of a Kinematograph Cameraman and The Mascot—were created by the genius himself. The latter became so popular back in the day that it was turned into a series with the lead, Fétiche (known as "Duffy" in English-speaking countries), starring in four more short films following the original's release in 1933.

The Mascot's story centers around an ill child and her destitute mother, the latter of whom makes ends meet by manufacturing toys. One of these playthings—Duffy the stuffed dog—comes to life and, at the child's behest, goes on a journey to find an orange. The other dolls made by the mother come to life as well and, when they are in transit to a market the following day, they break out of their crate and escape to wander the streets of Paris. Duffy remains behind and eventually arrives at a shop where he is sold as a decoration for a car's back windshield. It is from this vantage that the dog spots his creator, makes a break for it, and tries to follow her home.

He becomes lost along the way, of course. While avoiding city traffic and the shuffling feet of passerby, Duffy finds himself in a street market where, lo and behold, a ripe orange drops from a nearby stand. Mission accomplished! Or not, for the night is dark and full of terrors. When the sun goes down, who else should come to town but...Satan and his demon posse? Sure. They're all roaming free and having a helluva party, and that is very bad news for poor lil' Duffy, unfortunately.

All the city's trash join in the devil's festivities, and it turns out that Duffy's ol' pals have already found their way to the most happenin' sector of the city. While he fends off the fiends who try to steal his orange, the other toys experience a night of drunken revelry and become...not as friendly as they once were. Dawn couldn't arrive soon enough, but when it finally does so do the police. They aid in Duffy's escape. He makes it home, gives the child the orange, and lives happily ever after.

As can be seen in the above gifs, Starewicz employed some extraordinary approaches to capture his subjects' movements. One of these was to maneuver the puppets during the film's exposure so as to create a blurred effect. This allowed each gesture to appear natural and, in some instances, almost like CGI. He also adopted rear-screen projection reminiscent of today's chroma key compositing, i.e., green screen. At the HCoSF concert, I remember one of the members telling the audience that while everyone could try to figure out the mechanics of the piece, he suggested just watching and "believing in the magic" Starewicz had summoned. My eyes were glued to the screen as the picture played, and the effects truly were enchanting.

For more information:

• The Mascot on IMDB
• Click here to watch The Mascot in its entirety

Historical Cultural Commentary: The Wind Rises

“Le vent se lève, il faut tenter de vivre! [The wind is rising...we must try to live!]”

—Paul Valéry, “The Graveyard by the Sea” 

There was quite a bit of controversy in Japan when Hayao Miyazaki's last directed work, The Wind Rises, came out in 2013. Already known for being anti-war, this film was not the first of Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli to touch directly upon real-world battles (Grave of the Fireflies, Porco Rosso, From Up on Poppy Hill), but it certainly is the only one to not be completely mired in the past. Rather, the work exhibits parallels with modern day Japan's current militaristic endeavours and stagnant economy. The Wind Rises illustrates the idea that beauty and innovation turn ugly when used for destruction and death, semi-fictionalizing the life of Jirô Horikoshi—designer of an incredibly maneuverable fighter aircraft that served in WWII. The Second World War had a decimating effect upon Asia and the Pacific, and Japan as a country still faces that fallout to this very day. Countless artists have attempted to convey how things in that part of the world changed post-war, and Miyazaki is obviously no exception.

"Inspiration is more important than scale. Inspiration unlocks the future.
Technology eventually catches up." —Caproni

Meeting in a shared dream world, Jirô and Italian aircraft designer Gianni Caproni share an affinity for creating beautiful things. Neither wish to fuel antagonism on either side, but circumstances alter and wars demand certain...necessities. Both men unwilling shift their priorities in the ever-changing field of their profession but manage to maintain their ideal of 'a beautiful dream'.

Which would you choose: a world with pyramids, or without?

Humanity has always dreamt of flying, but the dream is cursed.

My aircraft are destined to become tools of slaughter and destruction.

…but still, I choose a world with pyramids in it.

Which world will you choose?

—Caproni

Unwilling to sacrifice their mutual incentive, each genius engineer respectively continues his work in the waking world. In many scenes, Jirô's dreams (and nightmares) often mesh with reality: it is often difficult to tell when the line between sleep and wakefulness is being blurred. I imagine this has to do with the fact that times of war are often surreal. It is possible that Jirô's human mind struggles to reconcile the atrocities to which he is, on some level, contributing. That guilt becomes so strong that it manifests itself within his imagination. For example, when he and Caproni first step into the same dreamscape, they both see a number of what I refer to as 'faceless war-happies'. These are soldiers rushing to the slaughter in numbers so multitudinous that they all lose their personal identity, instead becoming a collective of 'anybodies'.

"The fact is, this poor country pays us a lot of money to design warplanes.
Embrace the irony." —Honjô

In the film, Japan is years behind their competition and struggles to keep up with the rest of the world in terms of industry. Luckily for Jirô and his career ambitions, however, his is a country in which transportation plays an important, ever-growing role. Not just airplanes but trains, automobiles, trolleys, busses, penny steamers, large steam ships, and various warcraft are featured in numerous scenes. Still, the manufacturing company Jirô works for has a difficult time keeping up not only with their competitors in business but their Axis allies.

Honjô: It’s as if we’re a hare chasing a tortoise with a twenty year lead,

but in our little story the hare doesn’t sleep. We can close the gap,

but how can we beat it?

Jirô: We’re too far behind. We’ll always be chasing it.

Honjô: But…what other choice do we have?

Keep running and catch up someday?

Jirô: I wonder if there’s a different way to run?

Apart from war, Miyazaki provides only brief commentary on other historical/cultural issues. One of these is traditional roles for women, especially in relation to Jirô's sister and her desire to live in Tokyo to practice medicine as a doctor. This requires their father's approval which she obtains rather easily (and off-screen). Also of note is Jirô seeking Nahoko's father's blessing for their marriage, but aside from those two instances not much else is said about gender. Religion—an aspect popularized in Ghibli films by the widely known Spirited Away—is also sidestepped, with but one character touching upon it in regards to Shinto prayer. There is no mention of the conventional concept of man v. nature, either. This might be due to Miyazaki wanting to focus attention only on the main message of the film, which is understandable...if somewhat flat in regards to storytelling.

Flying machines are a prevalent symbol in many Miyazaki movies,
as are umbrellas (RE: Nahoko's parasol).

All in all, the 2014 English-dubbed version of The Wind Rises features a stellar cast of voice actors who do a fine job translating yet another beautiful dream by the visionary that is Hayao Miyazaki. The creator announced his retirement in late 2013 after the film's original release in Japan, and I personally cannot think of a better way for him to have said his goodbyes. While not as gripping or as whimsical as his previous animated masterpieces, TWR does make a statement that is more pertinent in today's society than any of his other works.

For more information:

• The Wind Rises on IMDB
• My masterpost on Studio Ghibli films

My inspiration for this post came about after discovering that a handful of Miyazaki's most popular films are currently being shown at a cinema near where I live. If you know of the Avalon, there is still time to go see Spirited Away and Howl's Moving Castle on the big screen. Fly, my pretties!

VFX: Paying Homage to the '80s in Kung Fury

I will forever stand by that statement.

Now and then there comes along a movie of unadulterated awesomeness: Kung Fury is such a film. Starting as a Kickstarter campaign in late December 2013, the project for a thirty-minute comedy short inspired by American action/cop creations from the 1980s quickly garnered a huge amount of attention and nearly 18,000 backers. Exceeding the original target goal of $200,000 by reaching more than $630,000 in only a month's time, filming began in July of 2014. The finished product aired free-of-pay on online platforms less than a year later, and the world became a much cooler place.

The End.

Dat poster, tho.
Content Advisory: Ages 15+ for some profanity and cartoonish/over-the-top gore.

Well, there's actually a lot more to this story. Writer/director/producer/VFX artist/lead actor/stunt performer/casting director/overall ridiculously talented Swede David Sandberg is the main man behind the movie. Known mainly for music videos and telly commercials, Sandberg began work on the script for Kung Fury back in 2012, shooting and compiling the trailer that would eventually release with the crowdfund. As for the plot, well...take it away, IMDB:

"In 1985, Kung Fury, the toughest martial artist cop in Miami, goes back in time

to kill the worst criminal of all time - kung fuhrer Hitler."

Best idea ever made even better by the astounding post-production VFX and compositing. They lend an incredibly authentic '80s vibe to the entire piece, whether it's a scene featuring a side-scrolling stunt sequence involving serious Nazi ass-kicking, or something more subtle like a stuttering effect seemingly caused by a worn VHS tape.

Sandberg gives a VFX breakdown in this video, going over chroma keying, the use of miniatures, CGI, and pyrotechnic 'splosions. (There are meant to be more clips in the series, but the last upload was in July of last year, so...) A number of cinematographers were involved in the making of this short film, including aerial director of photography Henning Sandström. He shot some fantastic fantasy-feel footage of rural landscapes in Norway for the scenes in which Kung Fury travels back in time to—ahem—the 'Viking Age'. Sandberg also got French studio Old Skull Games on board to create a low budget He-Manesque animated sequence toward the end of the film. "I believe that when you combine the best of two worlds—practical effects and visual effects—is when you achieve the best results."

Another all-important 'effect' is the original score provided by Swedish synthwave musicians Lost Years, Highway Superstar, Betamaxx, and the fantastic Mitch Murder. I personally love Retrowave, neo-progressive, and similar genres, so pairing that with hyper-violence, puntastic one-liners, and a plot like Kung Fury's made the film an instant hit for me. Not only that, but freaking '80s icon David Hasselhoff did a full music video for the movie's main theme, "True Survivor." The single as well as the complete OST remain available for purchase on vinyl (I shit you not).

But wait...! There's more! As if they had not paid homage enough to the Greatest Decade of them All™, Hello There published a video game companion called Kung Fury: Street Rage. Reminiscent of retro arcade beat 'em ups with similar mechanics to One Finger Death Punch, it is available on a variety of devices; there was even a limited edition Commodore 64 version.

This post actually comes at a preeminent time in KF history: it just won the Swedish Academy Award for best short film. Congrats, Guldbaggen recipients! The audience looks forward to seeing the full-length feature film version however and whenever that may come about.

Now, for shits & gigs, I wanted to share a few of the more unusual plot keyords tagged on Kung Fury's IMDB page.

• wearing sunglasses at night
• female bodybuilder
• handheld minigum
• raptor
• dismemberment
• viking helmet
• power glove
• historically inaccurate [I beg to differ]
• Lamborghini Countach
• naziploitation
• punched in the crotch
• parking meter
• skateboard

Watch Kung Fury in HD quality here.

The tropiest of tropes.

Masterpost: Foreign Television Series

I wanted to change things up a this month. Having posted to this blog for nearly two and a half years on all sorts of foreign films, I thought it was about time to review some television shows. Why? So glad you asked:

1. I have a personal preference toward TV series as they intrinsically have more time to plumb the depths (I use idioms now) of their created universes. There are of course many instances where cliffhangers and ambiguity can do a story wonders, but I am usually partial to fuller pictures.
2. They tend to have multiple writers and directors, so each episode has the chance to try on a new pair of shoes. Sure, now and then a particular writer goes way too far off the rails, but change is the spice of life. (Oh man. I'm actually kind of ashamed of that last one.)
3. Lately, a lot of shows have the same production value as big blockbuster hits.While they have always been able to mix genres more easily than specifically-marketed Hollywood flicks, the increase in budget flow for this art form has allowed the medium to shed almost all remaining constraints.
4. The characters. This might tie into the fact that shows have such rich scripts and longer, overarching plots, but it's undeniable that if a writer or an actor wants a character to grow and become fully realized, they must turn to a career in television. Audiences invest extra emotion when following a narrative if its characters share an entire journey with them. It's consciousness substitution, up to a certain point. Anyway, if given enough time any member of the cast can become incredibly compelling. And to compel is the main point of storytelling.
5. Title sequences. This is purely a guilty pleasure. I flippin' love opening credits, from their song selection to their font choice. Brit telly tends to have the best, but many Netflix Originals have awesome ones, as well.

Damn straight I do.

Because there are so many shows out there, I had to give myself some criteria to pare down my choices. Yay! Another list! Each show...

• could not have coloured mine eyes before I decided to do this post (therefore excluding any I've seen more than three months ago)
• had to come out of Western Europe, including Scandinavia
• none should overlap with another show from the same country (spinoffs excluded)
• could not have English as a first language (sorry UK & Ireland)
• must be subtitled, not dubbed
• needed to be available on Netflix for high-quality streaming (promise that I'm not sponsored, I simply did not want to trudge through dodgy stream sites with crappy load times and zero HD options)

Also note that, while some shows have numerous seasons, I only watched the ones on Netflix. Again I plead quality-snobbery, but it also has to do with the amount of time I had before this December deadline.

Let's do this. [The shows are listed in the order that I watched them, savvy?]

Gran Hotel (Spanish, 2011-2013, 3 seasons)

This show is oft described as the Downton Abbey of Spain (just compare their posters), but really it is far more intriguing. I liked the first few seasons of DA just as much as the next American yearning for a taste of early twentieth century England, but holy crap that stuff got dry fast. Gran Hotel, on the other hand, centers around a murder mystery (or two...or ten). It might be the Masterpiece Mystery in my blood, but I was instantly hooked. Sure there are plenty of plot holes (some of which are pretty major), and it's fairly obvious that some parts of series two and three were written on the fly, but—surprisingly—the intricacies are not too knotted so as to be convoluted. Rather, they are a nice leveler between some of the brilliantly built-up action sequences and other, less engaging scenes laden with exposition.

Because it comes out of Spain, there are touches of la telenovela which give the series a nice cultural flair for the dramatic. Highlight: Everyone is super slap-happy, which is FANTASTIC. While there are definitely instances of machismo, the male characters are certainly not afraid to show their emotions, be it hurt confusion or flat-out despair. The series gets major points for that, in my book. Direction: beautiful. Costuming: exquisite. Comedic aspects: on point. Historical awesomeness: pretty awesome—origins of forensic science FTW! Villainy: a tad hokey at times, but not terrible. Romance between our two protagonists: too precious for this world. This is in my top two of the eight series I set out to review. Soap operas (and shows with similar elements) really sink their claws into ya'.

Alicia + Julio 4EVA <3

Salamander (Belgian, 2012-2013, 1 season)

Ho boy. This one is a doozy. Let's start with the good: it's pretty. They sure didn't spare any expense on that camera! It captures crisp, well-coloured shots. Those flashback scenes are certainly distinguishable, what with the sepia filter. Umm...that's about it, unfortunately. A private bank gets robbed, and it turns out that this über secret organization of elites (called Salamander) had a bunch of incriminating evidence stored in numerous safety deposit boxes at said bank. Lead character Inspector Gerardi comes into the picture, and his life goes to shit when he tries to interfere. It simply isn't compelling, especially on a scene-by-scene basis. Every single female is sidelined (sometimes literally) so that Gerardi can play the hardened badass and go head-to-head with the baddies. 'Now it's personal' is a tired concept, to say the least.

As if that were not boring enough, absolutely nothing is left up to interpretation as some of the characters actually sit down and spell things out for the viewer on multiple occasions, playing the unnecessary part of episode recapper. Even the aforementioned flashbacks are both uninteresting and too many. Also, why would anyone store compromising information in a safety deposit box in the first place? Destroy that shit ASAP, foo'! Let's say for argument's sake that they had a good reason. We then have to ask why every flippin' member of Salamander would use the same bloody bank. -_- It is never a good sign when a show's premise is illogical. When at last it turns out that the person who stole from Salamander in the first place did so to settle a personal vendetta, I was already bored to death. Maybe everyone else was, too, and that's is why Netflix has now removed the show from its website.

A mystery that fails to be mysterious is the worst. Snore...

Spiral (AKA Engrenages, French, 2005-2014, 5 seasons).

Sweet baby J, please put the fifth season on Netflix! [+ the sixth whenever it comes out] This series and its cast feel so real, something which I attribute to great scripts and excellent acting. As a criminal investigation show I did not expect much from Spiral, but it manages to be infinitely interesting in that it follows not only a Parisian police force but the barristers and judges who then deal with the criminal element after they have been processed. It is gritty at times, refusing to shy away from darker human elements without getting hung up on tropey after-school-special storylines. All recurring characters play a major role in the unfolding of events with each thread leading to suspenseful, oftentimes heartbreaking conclusions. Another bonus is that the series has an explicit French vibe—an important cultural link which Salamander lacks. Not much else to say other than get your marathonin' chair ready, 'cause you won't be able to stop watching once you start.

Complex relationships help make Spiral feel authentic.
Also, Tintin is such a bae.

Rita (Danish, 2012-2015, 3 seasons)

Following the life of the eponymous school teacher with a rebel attitude, I found this show kinda meh. Subject matter and even the way it is filmed yo-yos between light/fluffy and the extreme/somber, including bits on drug abuse, teen pregnancy and abortion, gay pride v. harassment, et cetera. Oddly, though, the series merely wets its toes with those topics rather than delving beneath the surface and emerging with any serious commentary. That said, it is still wholly enjoyable for what it is even if the viewer can see the plot coming a mile away.

There are a few inconsistencies, too, such as Rita's family—a huge part of both seasons one and two—all but disappearing off the face of the earth in season three with no explanation as to why. This sort of thing would not normally irk me, only Rita's relationship with her kids is integral to her character. Dunno though. Perhaps I am just bitter that my grade school did not have a huge pile of bean bags in the common room, but I like to think that I would hold the American school system rather than a fictional series accountable for such an oversight. At any rate, Rita is crazy popular in Denmark—enough so that it has a Dutch remake called Tessa that began airing last month. Think I'll skip it.

Not much character growth, despite claims otherwise.

Hjørdis (Danish, 2015, 1 season)

Since Rita is fairly short, I decided to give its spinoff a bash. One word: regrets. D'you remember the Friends spinoff, Joey? The creators took a fan-favourite character and gave him a show of his own...which utterly tanked. While some characters do great in the background, that does not give them an automatic license to come to the forefront and do even better. Hjørdis is the same way. Sweet, awkwardly funny Hjørdis takes on a troupe of quirky loner kids to help them put on a play, facing down a group of bullies and bureaucracy from on high. There are corny slow-motions scenes, eyeroll-worthy montages, and a strange theme of 'special kids' that, for whatever reason, was also present in Rita. 'cause, you know, only unique kids deserve a teacher's full attention. Anyway, this spinoff is as awful as it sounds. (Worse, even.) Luckily, there are only four episodes, each one shorter than those in the original series...praise be to Cthulhu.

Uffe, Hjørdis' beau, is another character who just up & vanishes.

Hinterland (Welsh, 2014-2015, 2 seasons)
OK, so I cheated. The spoken language in Hinterland is technically English, but those Welsh accents are so darn difficult to understand at times that you practically require subtitles to get through an entire episode. (I jest! I simply wanted to watch this series. ;P) That aside, this show is pretty good. It has that austere, British murder mystery feel to it that I love to pieces. It actually reminds me a lot of Broadchurch. For starters, each of them are set in a picturesquely pastoral/coastal place that is prone to hiding dark secrets and grisly homicides. They also both star broody, male protagonists who are attempting to atone for something in their murky pasts while their slightly-more-plucky right hand women struggle to keep them on the straight and narrow.

The main difference between the two (apart from a distinct lack of David Tennant) is that Hinterland has about half the number of episodes per season (though their runtime is slightly longer). More importantly, they consist of multiple investigations rather than just one overarching story. This series also works at a much slower pace—something I found reminiscent of Branagh's Wallander. This is especially true when considering the long shots of the surrounding countryside and cliff faces. Foregoing comparison to other shows, though, Hinterland features a building narrative, multilayered characters, and some batshit crazy culprits. Again I beg Netflix to add the most recent season sooner than later.

Gorgeous direction paired with an eerie atmosphere equates to one winning formula.
Picspam captured by me.

Generation War (AKA Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter, German, 2013, 1 season)
Go figure that one of the only German-made television show I could find on Netflix has to do with WWII. >_> Anyhow, Generation War follows the lives of five young friends from the beginning to the end of the Great War as told from 'the other side'. One is a Jew (again, go figure), another his girlfriend who remains in Germany and struggles on the home front. The third becomes a nurse while the last two are brothers who head to the front line and end up fighting against the Soviet Union. Firstly, let me say that there are soooo many films about this period in history that they all take on a relatively similar cadence. It can be difficult to generate a fresh take: I get it, that's totally fine. Also note that, in the interest of political correctness and an attempt to gain sympathy for those who fought, this show is hardly historically accurate. Eh, that's also fine, since every other piece on the subject—German or American or whatever else—does the same thing. That does not excuse the level of cheese I had to wade through whilst watching this, though.

Yes, the action sequences, direction, and post-production work surpass even that of Band of Brothers. Yes, for the most part the acting is superb, but painting a picture that casts all five leads in the best light possible is, quite frankly, dishonest. For example, the creators somehow thought that it would be a smart move to create tension between Viktor and the Polish resistance by portraying the latter as a band of ultra violent, anti-semitic assholes. What? It's about war, it's going to be depressing, and perhaps I was not in the right frame of mind when I started this miniseries, but I can definitely understand why there has been some controversy around it even when abstaining from the nonsensical view of 'it's German | they're German | they were the bad guys | how dare they | 'murica fuck yeaaaa'. It will always be a tad difficult with semi-nonfictive works to take them for what they are: glossified entertainment. There is nothing inherently wrong with that; I simply find it inauthentic and corny.

War. War never changes.
(Fallout 4 was just released, so I kind of had to.)

Wallander (Swedish, 2005-2013, 3 seasons)
It was mentioned earlier that I really like Kenneth Branagh's version of Wallander based on the lately deceased Henning Mankell's series of novels of the same name. Though I ashamedly have not read any of the books, I still appreciate the severely depressed protagonist and the small, coastal town where he carries out his work as an investigative police officer. While Branagh's show has an all-English cast, it is still convincingly set in the town of Ystad and does not, in fact, feel super British. There are actually two Swedish portrayals of the same character (both of which preceded the BBC drama), so I chose to watch Krister Henriksson's more recent adaptation. Much to my annoyance, Netflix only carries seasons two and three, but because of that very fact there is not a lot of overlap between the mysteries I had already seen, so it worked out well enough.

Both variations have a similar episode length, melodramatic scenes, strong female characters, and—of course—the same obsessive detective. The similarities diverge after that. Henriksson plays a moody Kurt Wallander, one who does not get along too well with his colleagues. Those colleagues, however, get a lot more airtime and play a larger part than those in Branagh's which seems to be focused much more sharply on Kurt himself. Both versions of the man have pretty crappy personal lives, but that emotion seems rawer when Branagh plays the part. The direction is stark, though still scenic and beautiful, and it gives a sense of human psychology that is oftentimes not present in Henriksson's interpretation...although it is worth mentioning that his gives the audience a better sense of resolution at the end of each episode (something that helps the viewer to cope with all the dark shit that went on throughout and lends enough strength to watch the following installment). It is Nordic Noir, so ya gotta expect things to be bleak—it comes with the territory. After watching the available episodes, I still prefer Branagh's but am very glad that I watched Henriksson's for his stimulating take on such a great character and, obviously, the 'new' mysteries.

The actors even look alike.

Because of my 'no overlap' rule, I did not get a chance to watch other foreign shows like Borgen, The Bridge, Romanzo Criminale, The Killing, Braquo, The Eagle, et cetera. I reeeeeally wanted to, though! Who knows—I may write future posts on those if I ever manage to reach them on my intimidatingly long 'to-be-watched' list. Touching on series from other parts of the world would be cool, too. Until then, I hope you enjoyed this rather lengthy post. Let me know in the comments below if you have watched or plan on watching any of these series, as I would love to hear your take on them. Cheers!