My Personal Opinion...
I do think Cars could have been better at grabbing me from the beginning, but really - in my world, Happy Feet has no place in Academy lore. When I saw it, in glorious IMAX, I sat with my mouth open, amazed at its expressionless superficiality, its bland songs, its talentless voice direction and its illogical story. I smiled at a single joke - the seagull speaking of "alien abduction." At least Cars had me FEELING something for the characters, and it explored the warmth, charm and humor that was drilled into us by Frank and Ollie - values that I found sadly lacking in this overproduced piece of motion capture that doesn't even begin to do justice to the art of tapdancing... It seems that the MoCap-CG crowd in general does not want to learn from the past - and quality and entertainment suffer. Oh, well...
[Floyd Norman summed it up brilliantly on Cartoon Brew:
Frank Thomas made ‘em dance with only a pencil and paper.
Now, that’s impressive!]
I have not seen the Norwegian film The Danish Poet. I really liked The Little Match Girl, but as it was the only short I have seen, I cannot really say anything about this category...
[Floyd Norman summed it up brilliantly on Cartoon Brew:
Frank Thomas made ‘em dance with only a pencil and paper.
Now, that’s impressive!]
I have not seen the Norwegian film The Danish Poet. I really liked The Little Match Girl, but as it was the only short I have seen, I cannot really say anything about this category...
Labels: News, Ponderings
posted by Hans Perk at 6:42 PM
4 Comments:
I feel the same way, Hans. I think Happy Feet really doesn't deserve it. I believe Motion Capture isn't truly animation, but a bland & uninspiring knock-off of the real thing.
Well, I think MoCap COULD be ok, but only if it is used well, and well adapted, so it doesn't feel like and look like a cheap knock-off. But there is still a good way to go...
An addition: I DO believe Happy Feet to be a masterpiece: a masterpiece of MARKETING. A misleading happy-happy trailer and a zillion billboards etc all led the audience to believe they will see and have seen much more than they actually did. In this respect, the film - or to be precise, everything AROUND the film, needs to be studied closely...
I haven't seen Happy Feet so can't discuss it yet, but I had put my hopes on Monster House. Although the designs and horrible mocap were a pain ain the neck, I thought the story and filmmaking in general were excellent. I thought Cars wasn't much better than mediocre.
Monster House made me feel like an excited kid; Cars had me looking at my watch.
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