Blog for week 2 (1/29/2008)

The first piece of brilliant cinema we had the joy of viewing was "The Adventures of Prince Achmed" (1926) by Lotte Reineger. It is the oldest surviving piece of animation of film, though it doesn't look a day over 70. The basic premise of this film was there was a powerful magician who created a flying horse. To make the horse fly you pull a knob on his head and to go down you yank a lever by his tail. The magician shows the horse off to the king who wants it, and he offers anything he owns for it. The creepy magician wants his daughter, her brother Achmed defends her.
Achmed goes on the horse and flies away, but doesn't know how to operate it. He eventually figures it out and lands in a whore house. And for some reason decides to leave the whore house, even though they all are fighting for him. I guess it's a German thing.
He then lands at a lake and hides in the bushes to watch the princess and her two friends bathe (because that is less perverted than being in a whore house). He captures the princess, against her will, and takes her away with him. The animation was all done in silhouette. I found this to be somewhat abstract and artistic, though it created an atmosphere which i enjoyed. I did not enjoy the background colors at all. Though the lake scene was brilliantly done with the deep texture of blues and use of shadows, quite impressive given the technique.

The second silhouette animation was ZumbaKamera's "Bendito Machine" (2005). The basic story was there was a mountain with two villages on either side. One village bombed the other out and created a large factory on top. And for a while these villagers were living the life. Creating a multi storied village with a hot tub on the top most level. One man was in the tub and threw money at a woman who went under the water. Eventually, a robot blows up the whole village and everyone dies. The story was a warning against greed and capitalism. That if you are greedy and hurt people to get what you need and have a woman hold her breathe in a hot tub, you are going to die.
This animation was created using flash and relied heavily on sounds. While the characters were abstract in the sense that they had no realistic human features. They still exhibited emotion. The story (plot line) was strong. This animation was multi layered. In the animation technique and overall story arc.

Week 1

The first film was "Gertie the Dinosaur"(1914) by Winsor McCay. The film revolved around a bet between McCay and another man that McCay could not make the skeleton of a dinosaur come to life via animation. If McCay won the bet then the other man would have to buy dinner for their group of friends. For the next 6 months McCay created the animation, frame by frame, eventually creating 10,000 frames.
As the animation begins McCay asks "Gerite" to come out of her cave. She comes out an proceeds to devour a tree. McCay asks her to raise her right foot, which she does, then her left, which she also does after some coaxing and being given the treat of a pumpkin. She interacts with a sea serpent and tosses a woolly mammoth into a lake. Eventually, McCay enters the screen as an animated version of himself and rides the dinosaur off screen. Gertie's character was playful and childlike. Like an overgrown 2 year old asked to perform.
The second film, also by McCay was "How a Mosquito Operates". In this film a mosquito follows a man into his apartment and as the man sleeps, sucks his blood. As with Gertie there was a great deal of looping. As the mosquito sucks blood its bottom grows in size. Eventually rendering it unable to stand as it constantly falls over. Eventually the mosquito explodes after intaking too much blood. The mosquito had a moral of don't eat too much or you'll become fat and explode.