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A short but lovely, STOP MOTION ROBOTIC APOCALYPSE TRAILER!
Just the thing to go with boiling coffee over a dessicated can of sterno. The street finds its own uses for things, after all.
From Andy Goralczyk via Twitch.
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Earlier this year (well, actually as early I as supposed it’s possible to get as far as years go) I’d posted a roundup of animation to help get you through the Morning After (insert dramatic music here). I hadn’t realized it at the time but the director of tonight’s entertainment is the same one who also gave us that wonderfully animated and visceral version of Kafka’s Country Doctor, Koji Yamamura. Atama Yama, also known as Mt. Head, a short but visually stunning piece reflecting some of the more, shall we say, cyclical aspects of nature, both human and ecological. And our inability to really do much of anything about them.
It cropped up again recently, in one of my more inspired link wandering episodes, and for the longest time I couldn’t remember where I’d come across it before.
Then it hit me. I’d seen it late one evening while drinking wine years ago as part of an anthology, and interspersed with viewings of early David Lynch films (you know, for context. It was that kind of evening). I’d forgotten how much I’d loved the animation, particularly in the design of the background, and the narrative’s presentation as fable. It’s one of those works that will give you something new with every viewing, even if you don’t notice it at the time.
A fable of infinite regression. How enticingly ‘Meta’. I think I might actually be able to get behind that if my world looked this damned interesting.
Excuse me, I should probably open some wine.
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Tonight’s feature comes to us via a tip picked up from Japundit from Peter Payne’s J-List. In his post, Payne had ruminated that the emotional content and engagement in anime were the driving force behind its growing appeal and worldwide reach. I’d like to interject just a few thoughts of my own. While I think these sorts of universal storylines, and emotionally familiar and personally reminiscent characters are a fantastic force in storytelling (think for instance of Campbell’s hero cycle as displayed in Star Wars, which is a further execution of Beowulf). I think that misses a little bit of exactly why this is compelling to so many individuals. Much of the beauty I find in anime, and indeed, a work like Star Wars, is that it has the power to express tremendously complex philosophical and emotional concepts in what would be considered on the surface as a very basic form. It’s not unlike reading a layman’s guide to quantum mechanics. You have the ability to take much more away from it than the narrative or presentation actually impose upon you.
That said, there’s also the issue of stylization, which plays largely into how these narratives are perceived. If you’ve ever looked into anime, you’ve likely heard plenty of jokes about Moe, or alternatively, overt male androgyny (Disclosure: I’m still working on male anime hair). I theorize that there’s actually an extremely clever design behind the stylistic forms we associate with anime, and it’s the same one that keeps kittens and babies safe from predators.
They’re supposed to be exaggerated. You identify more with them that way.
Encountering a stylized human form (large eyes, exaggerated features, childlike behavior). Has always engaged an emotional parental response; it’s a biological imperative. This is what our young are born looking like. No wonder they evoke an emotional response. And look at what gates that opens for storytelling:
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Ah, 2009. You’ve gifted us with so much. We’ve had massive unemployment, huge bank failures, continuing wars, a general lack of civility, and another iPhone.
Cheers.
Its only fitting that 2010 [The Year We Make Contact](c’mon, somebody had to do it) should begin with a bang and not a whimper.
Bang accomplished. GWB, eat your heart out.
That said, I’m pleased to say that I expect a great deal out of our new double-digit overlords. Not in the least of which is a continuing drive to explore some of the forms we’ve been over in this column. Not that I’m actually going to do that this morning.
Yes, art is far from my mind, as I’m certain it is from yours as well. French Toast (sorry, Freedom Toast!) is likely a more effective consideration. But still, to aid you through this murky water that we call New Year’s Day, I bring you, Animation!
First up is The Amazing Screw On Head, created by Mike Mignola. Ages ago we’d posted this, but I’ve had a strange craving to revisit it throughout the holidays this year.
Next we have an animated adaptation of Kafka’s A Country Doctor, brought to us by Koji Yamamura. Beautiful and haunting, and utterly appropriate for this snowy morn.
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Right. Not exactly anime, I know.
Perhaps I’ve been overly influenced by the fact that a new comics store opened only three blocks away from me recently, but I’ve been on a tear through Transmetropolitan, DMZ, and The Walking Dead these last few weeks. And by tear my inference is that entire days, nay, whole weekends at a time have succumbed to their inky goodness.
Needless to say, my wallet hates me.
Then again, it probably hates you too. But that’s inconsequential. You’re not chained to the thing.
For me at least though, I enjoy the sheer physicality of holding a trade collection, or a book for that matter, down to the smell of the ink and even paper cuts. Antiquated, I know. But coming across a recent tweet announcing that Joss Whedon’s X-men was going all moving picturish on Hulu put me in mind of this. It’s a remarkable example of the successful convergence of forms. A moving comic. Not animated mind you, simply moving. And frankly, the outcome is really pretty stunning.
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Heh. This may be some sort of twisted personal best, but I’ve just discovered that a Google search for ‘Dystopian Anime’ now returns this column on both pages 1 & 2 ( who knows, maybe others too, I got bored).
Leaving aside what that actually might imply about my posting, in honor of this achievement we’ll take a little departure this evening into the just purely off-kilter, as opposed to the slightly more linear and focused oddities that my coverage usually entails.
I recall some years ago, during the midst of my redbull-fueled Netflix addiction, one evening the nascent BoL Consortium was debating the wisdom of watching a movie. Alas, the only thing we had at our disposal was an as-yet-unheard-of by any of us anime by the name of Gantz. Within the first few minutes, there were several yelps from the back of the room in addition to some notable cringing. As Cash Money put it to me recently, “It starts bizarre and crass. And ends bizarre, crass, and unexplained.”
While his description is utterly on the mark (and I’ve had more than a few cringe-worthy moments myself with this series), nevertheless there are probably a few guilty moments of that internal monologue we’ve all had at one point or another. In a sense I appreciate the attempt to make the characters sympathetic by being unlikeable. It’s a tactic that has served a number of authors well (I’m looking at you Chuck Palahniuk!), and sort of a staple of the modern sense of absurdism. It’s interesting to see it translated to the anime form.
[Read more →]
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Ahh, now this should be interesting. I’ll go out on a limb (I swear, no pun intended.) tonight, as this is one I’m only now delving into (though it seems highly recommended). If you’re here with me tonight, then I’ve brought Hirotsugu Hamazaki’s Texhnolyze along. Class warfare, prosthetics, and consideration of a culture which has become overly obsessed with technology and the necessary human consequences of such, seem to be the order of the day. A bit like Repo in the anime form. Let’s watch together, shall we?
