Zarafa: Travel and Adventure

There is something special about travelling. Moving through a landscape, across fields, through valleys, noting the complexity of ridges as mountains spill from peaks to foothills... Though there is little drama in travelling, journeys carry unique emotions: wonder, trepidation, awe. They tie back to fundamental human feelings: curiosity, fear, the ability to find beauty, the capacity to take in new knowledge and expand your cognizance.

As much as I appreciate tight, no-nonsense plotting (a requirement in some genres), most modern fantasies will zip from place to place just to get the plot over with; they ignore the moments of non-action and non-dialogue that do much to imbue beauty and mood into a work. Imagine if Disney's Frozen paused from the relentless sled-chases and wacky musical numbers, and attempted to evoke what it was like to ascend hostile, ice-shrouded mountains. By focusing a little more on the landscape, I think a deeper feeling of enchantment would have been achieved, and the movie would have not felt as surface-level as it does.

Zarafa, a film based on a true event, the a rare film that touches on these emotions. The very basic outline is: in a frame narrative, an African village elder tells a group of children how the first giraffe came to France. In his tale, a young Sudanese boy named Maki promises a dying giraffe he will take care of her daughter. When the animal is taken by a Bedouin merchant named Hassan and is renamed Zarafa, Maki follows the duo. Hassan eventually admits Maki into his group, and the trio arrive at a besieged Alexandria. There, the trio are sent on a mission by the Egyptian sultan to deliver Zarafa as a gift to the French king, who will hopefully be convinced to send forces to the Egyptians. Along the way, they encounter many obstacles: the journey is dangerous, and an evil slave trader is on their trail.

If the story of Zarafa were placed in the hands of lesser creators, the final product would have doubtless been forgettable. It is a story forged of tropes that have appeared in children's movies over and over again: a wonderfully feisty but otherwise flat hero; quirky secondary characters; an irredeemably greedy villain; mean and racist royalty. But if whittle down all movies to general plot, they become almost indistinguishable; surely, good movies have something to set them apart. 

NOTES:

- great enjoyment of travelling - connections, girraffe on pyramid, all part of the beauty of the world; from europe to africa; beseiged alexandria (kaleidescope of travel)
- level of realism? based on true events but fantastical, impossible; but never cartoonishly so
- humorous characters but never cartoonish


*Rating*: 3 out of 4 stars.

Gobelins Animated Shorts

How long is the shortest animation with a full story?

From my experience: around 1 minute.

The French Gobelins School of Visual Communication is well-known for its animation department. They produce shorts popular throughout the Internet because of their involving action and quality animation - many of which are only one minute long. The only flaw worth mentioning is that they're often too short, and thus too rushed to develop tension and tone through the piece.

MY FAVORITES (with links)

Fenrir - Quick plot: a mythical wolf escapes its eternal prison and tries to devour the sun. Excellent job simplifying the story into less than one minute of action, although the rapid pace leaves too little focus on the fantastical imagery or tension.

Le Lac Gele - A quiet, metaphorical short, with luminous creatures in a frozen landscape. Beauteous but once again, a little too rushed to for the viewer to take everything in.

Garuda - It concerns the universal: growing up. But the theme metamorphoses into something new with otherworldy imagery.

In Between - Not all of Gobelins' shorts are 1 minute long. This one is thrice that length, and the pacing is just right. Told with heart and humor, here is a tale wherein a woman faces her crocodile.

Copernicus - Copernicus has a vision of a new cosmological order.

Trois Petits Points - Innovative story of WWII; it's easier to be monstrous than not.

Rating: These innovative shorts range from 3 to 4 stars on the point scale - great job, Gobelins!

On Ratings

Like most other reviewers, I'll rate movies with these:

Just so that you know what each rating means, here is a quick post explaining that away.

1 STAR: Bad. Downright lazy. Dull, boring, cliche-ridden, often offensive.

2 STARS: OK. Average stuff, entertaining enough and with some inspired moments.  But also plenty of predictability, some cringe-worthy moments, and a pervasive feeling of been-there-done-that.

3 STARS: Good or very good. A solid watch; plenty of thought and effort went into making this. Not perfect - maybe there are generic elements, or a disjointed narrative, or the like. But there are also many high points: perhaps excellent art, riveting story-telling, gorgeous music, or anything that makes me smile when remembering the movie.

4 STARS: Superb. Now this is excellent; this film is created with virtuoso skill, artistically inspired, with excellent storytelling, and a unique combination of elements that touches the wood of possibility in a way no one has quite done before.

Also, let's add one more possible star rating. This unbalances the rating scale, placing the middle of the animation bell curve at 2 stars out of a possible 5, but I need something to distinguish the excellent from the stellar. Four star movies astonish; but there are simply movies better than them we must distinguish them from. (Sort of like when Roger Ebert designates a film a "Great Movie.")

5 STARS: Superlative. Groundbreaking. Magnificent and awe-inspiring from sheer beauty and poetry. Deeply heartfelt and aching. After viewing, I can't remember what it was like not to have seen it.

Hello, world!; or, Blog Introduction

1937, Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs forever changed the world of cinema. Here was the world's first animated film - a story that danced at the border of dream and reality. The characters moved following the rules of gravity; they obeyed the emotional laws of kindness, jealousy, grief, tenderness. And yet, through being drawn, the movie could trade the "real world" realities of acting and filming for a visual style that showed the very essence of the story.

In old legends, fair maidens consorted with birds; kindly dwarfs unearthed fat jewels; evil queens brewed potions and schemed. These were images Snow White showed. The purity of a person was communicated by showing that the person was beloved by gentle forest animals. These images were impossible in live-action, yet essential for fairytales to gain resonance. Animation opened a new avenue for storytelling in this way: it made any setting, character, or idea possible. It is not very surprising that Sergei Eisenstein, director of the classic Battleship Potemkin, called Snow White the greatest movie ever made.

As Disney showed with Snow White, animation is limitless. It can explore any idea from any angle, can parade marvels before our eyes, and can create dazzling and impossible action scenes. Yet, what happened in the eighty years since the movie? The majority of the Western public sees animation exclusively as a children's genre, a genre that cannot be taken seriously. For a genre that can do virtually anything, most animated films are dull, banal. The most well-known and critically-acclaimed ones - winners of the Academy Award - follow well-trodden paths beaten by old Disney himself. Why? Other parts of the forest are dark and deep and untouched.

The Forest, from the stunning The Secret of Kells

The answer is, there are great animated movies out there. Most of them are simply and unfortunately poorly-known (not all - Miyazaki, for example, is a genius rightfully celebrated). My goal here is to seek out the greats of animation (famous or obscure), and review what I unearth in posts both short and long. I'll be looking at various lists (for example, winners and nominees at the Annecy Film Festival) and will look at movies, anime series, and animated shorts. Hopefully, I find some great stuff!