LEVIATHAN 2012

Here's another film that I saw at Steve's recently. Don't confuse it with a different film made two years later with the same name. You want the one with title lettering that looks like a tattoo artist or a biker did it. 

Ask ten people what the film's about and you'll get ten different answers. For me it's about the way the world really is: the chaotic way our senses actually perceive the world before our brains have a chance to process the information and make a pleasing story out of it.

The film takes place on a New England fishing boat but it could just as easily have been about a walk in the park. Wherever we are life bombards us with a cacophony of sound and images which our brains filter through algorithms. Those algorithms create for us a  three-dimensional map and a sense of what's in that map and how it can be used to enhance our survival.  It's amazing that we can do that.

It's scary to think that we might have been visited by intelligent space aliens many times in the past but they simply failed to notice us. Their own algorithms might have attached more significance to that rarity in the universe: the radiation protected, surface ocean. Or maybe the cacophony of all the splashing droplets and weather might have overwhelmed their senses. Maybe their image of the Earth is of a baffling place of loud white noise. Maybe they were glad to have left it.




Anyway, here's (above) a trailer for it. To make its point the film has to be immersive so widen the picture to full screen mode and crank up the sound. If you see the whole thing, try to see it in a theatre rather than on a video at home. Or better still, if you live near L.A., see it at Steve's house next weekend. Contact him at:

http://animationresources.org/

VIDEO GAME IDEAS

Above, a Theory Corner exclusive. It's an idea sketch for a Spumco laxative commercial, never made. 

Although this was done on another studio's paper, I think this (above) was part of a test for a freelance storyboard spot on a Warners show. I didn't get the job; maybe because I worked too rough. Anyway it shows Bugs playing baseball in drag, stealing a base from Elmer.

That's an arm pinch, not a nipple pinch!

Maybe I ran afoul of the paperless office concept. I should have used a Cintiq. I was just daunted by the $2,000 price tag. I figured I'd get the job first then buy the hardware, but things don't work that way. Yikes! An expensive lesson.

More trees for the video game. I love drawing trees.

Above, for the video game, a dude throws his gang sign.

How did finger signs ever get popular? Who was the first one to do that?

FOR MY KID

My kid's feeling down in the dumps now and I thought I'd post something to cheer him up. Here, courtesy of Steve, is Jack Stanford, "Eccentric Dancer Extraordinaire."



The Jazz number Stanford dances too is pretty good but I think it would work even better with this song, which comes courtesy of Mike. It was used in the 4th season of "Breaking Bad."

Cheer up, Guy!

[BTW: on my computer the YouTube video above was slow to appear. I hope it works better for you.]

SUPPORT GROUPS

HORACE: "As the group leader I'd like to welcome you all to the first session of the Extremophile Support Group. Daisy, maybe you'd like to start."

DAISY: "Sure, I'll start. What are we all doing here? I look around the room and I don't see anybody who looks offensive. I don't even know what an 'extremophile' is."

MARIGOLD: "I'm only here because my mother said there'd be food."

TULIP: "I don't know about the others here, but I'm offended by the woman sitting beside me." 

IRIS: "Yeah, what's with her? Why is she...well, you know..."

DANDELION: "If you're referring to me, then the proper term is 'undraped.' That's my extreme. I simply prefer to live the way nature intended, the way birds live."

HOLLYHOCK: "You want to wear... feathers?"

VIOLET: "I think she's saying she wants to be buck naked."

MAGNOLIA:"Well, I think Dandelion has the right to dress whatever way she wants. This was a free country the last time I looked."

PETUNIA: "Yeah...free to be WEIRD!"

GERANIUM: "Well then I'm free to take my extremophile fist and..."

HORACE (VO): "Now, now, Ladies...we're all extremophiles here and we need to show sisterly solidarity. "

GERANIUM: "Haw! Look who's talking...from a guy, no less!"

HORACE: "Maybe we need to cool down for a few minutes. Let's take a muffin break.  I made them myself, but I have to warn you...they're for eating only on the right side of the mouth."

TALES OF HOFFMANN

If you saw the Powell/Pressberger film "Red Shoes" and didn't like it then you're not going to like this film either, because it's Red Shoes on steroids.

I like Red Shoes a lot but I sympathize with people who cringe at the almost too rich, over-the-top gaudiness of it. Even so, the film is a neat piece of work and so is its 1951 successor, "Tales of Hoffmann." I just saw Hoffman over the weekend at Steve Worth's house and that's what I'll talk about here.

The opera was written by Offenbach in 1880 or thereabouts. He died months before the play opened and while the music and libretto were still undergoing changes, a significant fact it turns out.

Since there were different and disputed versions of the original manuscript, successive producers took liberties with the opera and customized it to their liking.

That liability turned out to be an asset. The opera is never without backers who want to attach their own vision to it and as a result it's been staged frequently and creatively through the years, with enormous variety in the art direction.

The Powell/Pressberger version (above) is a tour de force of visual style. It ranges from a kind of dry-brushy, modern type...

...to designs derived from old tapestries and beer steins...

...to a kind of impressionistic surrealism (above) reminiscent of Odilon Redon.

I'll digress for a moment to explain that Redon (his work, above) was a French symbolist painter of the 19th Century. That movement was a precursor of Surrealism. You don't hear a lot about it anymore, and it's not really my taste, but it was tremendously influential in theatrical design.

Anyway, the dominant background style of the film is a surreal take on the traditional Romantic ballet style (above). Even in that context there's plenty of innovation. Take this shot, for example. Note the color and lighting on the archway of marionette heads.

There's a cut to a close-up as the ballerina dances closer to camera and when we return to a wider shot the colors and lighting have changed. Not only that but the marionette heads have been switched for slightly different ones. Look closely...some of them aren't the same.


 Martin Scorsese is a big fan of this film. He likes the unreality of it and claims that he learned how to compose cinematic scenes from it. He also got the idea of shooting to music from this film.

Here's the trailer. If you buy it be careful, though. Americans will want the version that plays on our electronics.

STILL MORE VIDEO GAME SKETCHES

Above, a wacky Mount Rushmore-type background for the Western Level. I hate to say it, but it probably didn't work very well. A vivid border graphic like this brings too much attention to the level's edge, which should appear limitless.

Here's a Chief's Hut for the Jungle Level.

Haw! Here's another version of the Chief's Hut. I thought about crowning it with a big bone but some might have found that offensive. Geez, I can think of a bunch of ideas for this that weren't apparent at the time. I wish I could take another shot at this.  

This one (above) was for the Haunted House Level. The skater peels off the wall onto a trap door which takes him to another corridor. 

Yes, guns make every game better. 

Here (above) the skater skates around the walls, avoiding the mouth that tries to eat him.

The mouth widens to include the entire floor (above, bottom left) and the big tongue snags the skater. I was asked to modify this and the changed version appears on the upper left. I'm ashamed to say that I can't remember who cleaned this up. 

This sketch (above) wasn't done for the video game...it was for an insurance company...but I include it here because I wish I'd thought of it when I did the game. If there had been an American city level I could have had the skater run into zealous Boy Scouts who walk pedestrians across the street, whether they like it or not.

   

Above, the edge of a Western town. The boardwalk leads to a mine and an Indian village.

Geez, there's more I could post but maybe that wouldn't be fair to Atlus, who I believe is the copyright holder. 

MORE VIDEO GAME IDEAS

I thought the Theme Park Level needed a Founding Genius (above) who was ever present, compulsively making sure the park ran okay. These sketches weren't approved, maybe because they looked too much like Disney.

Too much fairy dust (above) prompts The Founder to reach for his bug spray. I posited that The Founder regarded the skateboarder as a bug marring the perfection of his park, and he tried to eliminate him.

Above, theme park stuff. 

Two of these sketches were done for the Japan level, the sun was for the Western level. I should have left more space for what I hoped would be beautiful Japanese lettering on the scrolls.

Here's a Tokyo sketch (above) that also wasn't approved, and its easy to guess why. Tokyo is envied throughout the world for its low rate of crime, and a situation like this just doesn't apply. It's too bad because it would have been fun to try to imagine what a cartoony "bad side of town" would look like.

Above, nixed for the same reason...also understandably. The nice thing about quick sketches is that when they don't fly they can be put aside without much time being lost.

Of course the Tokyo Level is riddled with ninjas (above).

Haw! Here's some generic villagers from the Fantasy Level. They're not nice guys and they're always trying to trip the skateboarder (boarder not shown here). The boarder has to be careful lest the Wandering Giant eat him along with the villagers. The giant isn't the main character on this level, he simply appears once in a while when the player least expects it. 

Above, paper panels in the walls of a traditional Japanese house.

For more video game sketches type "video game" in the search box of the Uncle Eddie's Theory Corner right sidebar.