Monday, April 02, 2007
MY FAVORITE NFB CARTOONS
These National Film Board films from the late 70s and 80s are among my favorite cartoons of the last several decades. It's hard to believe now but there was a time when Canada was poised to take over the cartoon industry. Why it didn't happen would make an interesting book. The creative people were there but business mysteriously failed to recognize and support them. Why? I can only guess. As time went by a lot of NFB people were absorbed into mainstream TV and a great opportunity was lost.
"Get a Job" (above) was done by Brad Caslor who I'm told has since renounced animation and is now a live-action editor with an interest in radical left politics. People say that the Job film nearly broke his back. It was an enormous undertaking for one man and his friends to do and the film board subsidy wasn't enough to feed a mouse. When he finally dotted the last "i" in 1985 he swore "Never Again!" and turned his back on animation. Too bad! His own style was great and the Clampett influence certainly didn't hurt.
Here's (above) "The Cat Came Back" (1988) by Cordell Barker.
Here's (above)"The Big Snit" (1984) by Richard Condie. Condie's doing 3D now but I like his old 2D stuff better. His last film may have been "La Salla." You can see a clip from it on the NFB site.
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31 comments:
I'm Canadian (from the province of Manitoba) and I had all these cartoons on a tape ("Amazing Manitoba Animation")...all these came out of the NFB studios in Winnipeg.
I watched that tape more than any other one I owned as a kid. Got the cartoons memorized (especially Cat Came Back...although looking at them again Get a Job is *fantastically* animated).
Like you said, it's pretty amazing most of these were animated mainly by a single guy with some help from his friends/family on next to no money.
"Get A Job" was one of the big awakenings for me as soon as I graduated college in 2001. It showed me that quality cartoons could still exist and I strive for that kind of quality still even today. It also opened my eyes mainly because at the time I was leaving my family's home to live on my own and make a name for myself and "Get a Job" reminded me of what I was going to go through soon.
I got my whole resume and portfolio ready and turned it in into 50 or so companies, many of them falling due to the big dot-com bubble burst at the time. People living in LA seemed to be the only kind of folks getting any work at the time.
In a sense I always thought the director of "Get a Job" may have been reflecting a great part of his life as it is very hard for people with a great personal vision to get work. Nowadays it seems like people get turned off by that (which is so sad and can be clearly seen by the decline in the quality of cartoons nowadays). I remember many substandard students getting work often knocking down the more talented ones. It's like a lot of major studios want to see a lot less personal vision in their work nowadays as well in order to appeal to the masses (in fear of offending someone or simply not wanting to take a risk). Which is sad because we are seeing less and less personal films such as the National Film Board of Canada shorts.
Heck the days of "O' Canada" airing on Cartoon Network is over. Nowadays crappy shows like Aqua Teen Hunger Force are favored.
Today I work doing animation and while it's a good job n' all (I animate videogames nowadays, best job I ever had and loving it) it's not doing cartoons. I do my own shorts at home and while it may take long I get a sense of satisfaction that no studio will ever control it, even though I won't make money from it. It seems to me in order to get your work out to the masses you have to do your own cartoons and put them out the web because a lot of companies out there don't want to take a risk and give the money needed to make the film of your dreams.
I know what the director of "Get A Job" means when he quit. He should've gotten a huge amount of pay for unleashing his genius among the world (shame on a lot of people for not noticing it!). It pisses me off because the big wigs and mainstream mass cannot see how good this kind of stuff really is. It's like you get praised more for doing less effort and getting patted on the back for it. Aqua Teen Hunger Force is PURE PROOF of that! :(
I hope the director of "Get a Job" comes back one day to treat us to his delicious candy of "24fps shot- on-ones" glory of inspirado. I also hope one day a big studio will hire John Kricfalusi and give him the proper funding to run their shorts division. Maybe then it will finally show me the industry is heading towards the right direction.
I get tired of hearing praises for crap like Thundercats, He-man, Transformers and Power Rangers! GIVE ME "Get a Job," "The Cat Came Back" and the "Big-SNIT" any day over all the crap today.
Wow, what an amazing piece of work Get a Job is! It's funny and animated very fluidly.
If you like to explore more animation NOT coming from the US, maybe you'd like to check out the opening sequence from a German animated feature made in 1990, Werner: Beinhart!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lPoHuIivAm0
I'm posting this here, because the style of those cartoons you posted reminded me of it. It's German language, but the action and the animation is so funny, it should be fun anyway. Most people outside of Germany will probably not know about this cartoon.
hey, i love The Big Snit! You have pretty broad tastes, Eddie. When I read John's blog (or other strictly cartoon related) i always become aware of the division between my cartoon self and my artsy fartsy self. I wonder if there's a place for people who like different kinds of animation.
oh, and thanks for the stuff i didn't know! Get a Job is great!!
Hi Eddie,
I have tons of theories as to why Canada's animation industry is as dismal as it is....however, I don't post those particular theories on the internet as it tends to make enemies...maybe one day when I'm in LA I can rant at you about it...it's a sad tale....
Mmmm.... "The Cat Came Back" was a right of passage amongst my peer group. Watching it transports me right back to grade school!
There is a book that was published outlining the Canadian Animation boom!
It's called "Cartoon Capers: the Adventures of Canadian Animators".
If you can find one, pick it up! It's filled with the history of Canadian animation history.
get a job is a great film, so glad you recognized it! Its too bad Brad stopped directing. Nice to hear about his political views though.
I remember seeing The Big Snit and The Cat Came Back on cartoon network a long time ago. There were a lot of sort of cutting edge, or just border-avant-garde stuff going on, yeah, but nothing like Get A Job. That was pretty amazing.
I've never seen 'Get a Job' before, I really liked the scene where the bums are looking into the trash can.
The punchline was pretty great too.
Oh, god, this brings back bad memories from TVO. I can't belive I paid for these films.
The "Get a job" cartoon really spoke to how I feel about getting a job when it is a job I would really like to have. The pig that is singing in it totally reminds me of Ralph Bakshi. The Theory Corner Theater always shows the best shows in town!
I wish I knew the answer. There is a ton of animation and comedic talent in Canada, but the business doesn't support us there(Not that it does here)
The Big Snit is hilarious, but sadly not as known as Get a Job or The Cat Came Back.
Thoses were fun cartoons. I just saw "The Big Snit" in class the other week. Kind of depressing stories about what happened to them. Simple animation is always the best, lets just hope the net brings this good stuff back...
Those were great, Eddie!
Thanks. I had only seen "Cat Came Back.". That was long ago. "Get A Job." was really neat and fun to watch. And, like you said, Clampett influenced.
"The Big Snit" was celebrated in its day but that was a quarter century ago.
"OH MY GOD!!!"
I had did not know that you liked those films from The National Film Board Of Canada! They are all my favorite NFB films too. I love "The Big Snit", "Get A Job" and "The Cat Came Back"! Thanks for brining those classic films up!
I also love Richard Condie's film "Getting Started".
That was the first time i've seen "Get a Job" even though i've heard people talk about it before.
My jaw actually dropped watching the animation in that short.
It hasn't done that on any modern animation so far.
Wow, thanks Eddie, I didn't know about any of this. "The Big Snit" was my favorite. So original, and high-larious too!
I saw those films back in the late 80's, along with other "artier" Film Board animation. Those 3 cartoons were my favorite, though.
Caslor and Barker are terrific animators! They must have really analyzed Clampett cartoons studiously.
Keep up the good work educating the great unwashed masses, Eddie.
The late, great NFB Manitoba animation unit ! Gone , but not forgotten by us ol' timers. And perhaps because of posts like this more people are getting to see and appreciate these great cartoons. Excellent selection of shorts, Eddie. I'm so glad you posted these. I have them all on tape and pull them out from time to time to appreciate them again. Each of them is a special film, but I'm always especially amazed by Get A Job. It really is a tragedy that the experience soured Brad Caslor on doing animation. Would have loved to see how he would have developed as an animator and director.
"Sawing for TEENS !"
Everybody: I agree, some great stuff here! I'm going to see if I can ferret out the other films mentioned here!
Oliver: Interesting film. I can see a slight Condie and Barker influence and maybe even a little Bakshi.
Nick: Nice to hear from you! I'd love to hear the theories that you mentioned. A friend told me the NFB turned out mostly arty films and the few done in a commercial style like these just got lost in the mix.
By the way, if people want more stuff in this vein Condie did some other stuff almost as funny as The Big Snit, like The Apprentice (I actually think this one is funnier than Snit) and Getting Started and Barker did another one called Strange Invaders that was really beautiful and rather dark.
I don't think Brad Caslor's COMPLETLY given up animation.
In the end credit for Cordell Barker's "Strange Invader," Caslor was listed for "thanks."
So it seems he's still involved in animation, even if it's only enough to just get "thanks" in the credits.
I also enjoy the Log Driver's Watz
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ODEcxypvIZU
Anon: That's the one about bugs getting into the country? That's great!
Actually, I linked to the wrong one (the one I linked is great, too).
The Log Driver's Waltz is here: http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoID=1876599565
i too grew up on this stuff,and what can you really say about it,witout sounding fucking nuts?what's truly amazing about the NFB is that it's a GOVERNMENT run organization and considering that fact while watching this stuff makes it seem like some kind of freak of nature,animation is so much more than the hollywood crap factory......
and hey, slingshot ent. has two dvds of this stuff called ANIMATION GREATS @ 13 bucks a pop!
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