Forum - View topicExperimental Anime?
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Kagemusha
 Posts: 2783 Location: Boston |
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I both agree and somewhat disagree with what jfrog said about traditional plot, because there are some examples where heavy-plots have worked spectacuarly, though I generally agree with the point he's making.
I also agree Princess Arete is well worth the watch for anyone. The thing about the label "experimental anime" is that it scares alot of people off; I know the problem with getting people into things like alternative comics or art cinema is that some of the fans act like pompous not-so-nice-people, which unfortunatally has become a generalization in the eyes of some people for fan of avant-guard media. Lucky, no one seems to have this attitude here, and I can't think of better ways to get people into experimental stuff than a helpful thread like this that doesn't talk down to people. And honestly, as much as I love stuff from people like Tarkovsky, I also love conventional action epics (I've seen True Lies about 20 times) and would much rather watch something like Pirates of the Caribbean on a big screen than Stalker, even if the later is a better film. I think things like Mindgame and Tekkon (assuming it stays true to the manga) are so important because they're so accesable to mainstream audiences, if only for the fun factor (not to mention strong emotions). |
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Cloe
Moderator
 Posts: 2728 Location: Los Angeles, CA |
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I know people into independent animation who watch it specifically because it's little-known, which is pointless. You should be drawn to something because you like it, not because other people don't. I hate how when we're talking about a title someone might not know about, if anyone asks "What's that? I've never heard of it before?" the uber-pretentious-indie-animation person will say something like "Of course you don't know about it; it's only meant for people who don't watch mainstream crap. I hate it when more and more people watch something that's meant to be niche." I mean, what purpose does a statement like that possibly serve? If everything was up to me, all the titles we've been talking about here would be as widely loved and praised as any other anime. The reason I'm trying so hard to get people to watch Kemonozume is because I love it so much and want as many people to see it as possible. Just because something becomes mainstream doesn't mean it's suddenly bad. I love it when stuff like FLCL or Satoshi Kon's work becomes a huge hit; I feel like I'm sharing something special with lots and lots of other people. So, yeah. Everyone, see Mind Game now! Watch it! Kemonozume too!
Jumping was also included on this excellent VHS compilation with some other incredible Japanese short animations. In fact, the whole video series is great. If you're able to find them, snap them up! |
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StudioToledo
 Posts: 847 Location: Toledo, U.S.A. |
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Would a downloaded AVI count?
Best I have is the Lumivision LaserDisc release of "Robot Carnival" in my collection, which does have both English and Japaense audio tracks (albeit, for those two segments). |
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StudioToledo
Posts: 847 Location: Toledo, U.S.A. |
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I have this already. Essentially this was more a mini-series produced by John Halas in the 80's that was also made to accompany a book he wrote based on the subject matter as well (have the book too). I have all the episodes I recorded on DVD from some public library tapes. They don't show nearly all of "Jumping" on that one though, but I like the few clips of an interview Tezuka had where he talked about how he viewed animation by that point in time. One tape I found both "Broken Down Film" and "Jumping" on was from a cassette that was made available from a Chicago-based group called "Picture Start" from '86 called "Award Winning International Animation 1980-85", from the "New Shorts on Video" sereis. The print quality of them though weren't nearly up to snuff, resembling dupe 16mm prints or such, but that was the first I saw of those two films, along with some familiar favs I used to see on Showtime in the 80's like Paul Vester's "Sunbean" and Paul Driessen's "Spotting a Cow". In 1988, Expanded Entertainment (a subsidiary of the trade publication, Animation Magazine) began to release videos based on their theatrical film series, "International Tournee of Animation" and "Animation Celebration". These tapes were terribly expensive, and I've only managed to pick up used copies off eBay years back to get most of 'em. "Jumping" was included in volume 1 of "International Tournee" while "Broken Down Film" was on "Animation Celebration Vol. 1". The print quality of their releases was a lot more competent and decent for their time, and I got to see a lot more material that I haven't seen before, plus stuff I had seen once or twice from the days when Showtime, HBO and other cable channels used to run short films to fill up spaces inbetween movies. A lot of these shorts aren't currently available on DVD or anywhere else for that matter, and often I keep shaking my head with the notion that the best venue outside the net would be VOD (Video On Demand), assuming anyone would want to watch 'em there. Only wish someone bothered release a DVD of Tezuka's shorts personally, but it's nice some group has been fansubbing much of it so far (Jumping and Broken Down Film can just be released as-is due to their dialogue-less scenarios). I think both Jumping and Broken Down Film are probably up on YouTube as well unless they weren't taken down lately. |
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Swissman
Posts: 769 Location: Switzerland |
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Actually, there's a [url=http://www.cdjapan.jp/(one_line)/detailview.html?KEY=PIBA-3084]japanese DVD[/url] with some of his experimental shorts, alas without english subtitles. Hope this helps. Robot Carnival got also a CLV-Laserdisc release by Streamline Pictures (Lumivision). I've been lucky enough to get a copy for free. |
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StudioToledo
Posts: 847 Location: Toledo, U.S.A. |
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I know it's out. Just don't have the wad to blow on it for the moment.
Heh, I had to buy out via eBay. Back then some of Streamline's title got LD releases like "Twilight of the Cockroaches" and "Lensman". The LD for "Twilight of the Cockroaches" was a letterboxed, subtitled editino of the film, as opposed to the dubbed full-frame edition that was on VHS. In the case of "Robot Carnival", the Japanese tracks for those two segments were on the digital channel, while the English was on analogue. |
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Magenta Syntax
 Posts: 16 Location: Seattle, WA |
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I want to put His and Her Circumstances (Kare Kano) out here for director Hideaki Anno’s experiments in telling the story.
I usually skip end credits and intro’s for the next episode in TV anime. But for this series, they are something special and worth watching: they are read live on video, by the voice actresses - who have a great time doing it. And in the US DVD - hit your angle button during this, and you get to see the English VA's doing the dub: equally if not more entertaining, IMHO. How often do we get to see the seiyuus? H&H had some budget and writer/director conflicts behind the scenes, but those problems also led to some fascinating experimental episodes. One was shot mostly on video, with cutout characters puppeteered on sticks from below, going through the story. While some felt cheated of animation, the end credits told how this was a one-off experiment: They rolled over a reverse-video sequence of the cells and cutouts used in the episode being burned! This was not a haphazard burning of disgust, because the sequence ended showing a cell of our main characters smiling happily on top of the unburned pile. The most significant stylistic experiment was a role reversal of dialog and description. In TV anime, we expect to hear characters talk, and in manga-style sequences common to this series, see supporting words over their heads. (e.g., “In Love,” “Actually Hates Squid,” “Center of Universe.”) Instead, this episode’s story unfolded mostly in still frames: character stuff was written, and the character’s beliefs and emotions were spoken in third-person phrases. Integrating screen dialog with the spoken phrases exercised my brain, and that was clearly the director’s intent. He’s asking: If the entertainment (the story) is worth having, is it also worth working for? Most viewers of this TV anime probably said “No – I watch this stuff to mindlessly escape from the world, not work.” But in this thread, I think the answer is at least a qualified Yes. |
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beezis
 Posts: 76 Location: BC Canada Eh? |
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I can't believe no one has mentioned Gankutsuou as being experimental. The textured clothing instead of being drawn stands out so much it was near impossible to ignore for me. Forgive my ignorance if Gankutsuou was not the first to attempt this but it is the first I know of.
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Iconoclast
 Posts: 56 |
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Oh I adore this series <3 <3 I agree with you too. I'm not familiar with other animation that have done the whole texture thing (probably??) ... but it's fresh to me. =) |
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Steve Berry
Posts: 522 Location: San Francisco Bay Area, CA |
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Cloe, thanks to your recommendation I sat down last night and watched a bunch of the Tezuka shorts that I got as torrents. People, I've got to tell you-- there is some very good stuff in there!!
My personal favorites were Mermaid, Tales from a Streetcorner, Memory, Jumping, and Brokendown Film. What's great about Tezuka is that he not only stretched some of the the animation, did some interesting things visually, etc. but he really has something to say about being human. There's some wisdom in these little films. Some examples of stuff that really struck me-- In Mermaid, everyone is drawn just as outlines (i.e. you can see the backgrounds through them), as if all the world were not quite real. However, when someone wears a uniform, or some "codifying" piece of clothing, these are solid-- as if more real than people. Also, Tezuka's commentary on higher learning/books and it's ability to rob one of true imagination was something I thought insightful, if a bit controversial. In Brokendown Film the use of the film breaking down in the fights between the two cowboys was very funny and inventive. Something I haven't really seen before, and an innovative way to break down the "fourth wall". Me and my wife both repeatedly laughed outloud watching this. In Memory there are some great sections that demonstrate very well how we remember only bits and pieces of things we see-- the scene where the women become only their bodies and their head dissappear was, I thought, dead on about the way most men (all, perhaps, at times) see women. I also thought the commentary on the dropping of the bomb, and the things the iconic mushroom cloud morphed into was both a beautiful, sad, revealing, and funny thing. There was some real magic in this, at the same time that much of it was very tongue in cheek. The shorts like Tales from a Streetcorner and Jumping have a circular quality to them, which gave me the feeling of watching something that was sort of representing a large portion of life, condensed into 40 mins or 8 mins, respectively. Particularly in Tales from... there's a real encompassing of life-- romance, death, playfulness, childhood, family, war, jealousy, fear, hope, etc. And there aren't even any people in it. I loved how so many of the protagonists were simply posters on a wall-- much as if we "advertise" or label ourselves as certain things, to relate to others as well. It just made me think. Plus, as before, Tezuka isn't afraid to let his characters be hamballs to get a laugh out of you. All I can say is that these were some of the better shorts I've ever seen. They really used the form, and obviously could've cared less whether their animation quality was superb or not. That's not really why they work. I wish there were more like these out there. |
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StudioToledo
Posts: 847 Location: Toledo, U.S.A. |
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I sorta put him up there with another animator I fav from Italy, Bruno Bozzetto. He's also into doing simular work in his style that often speak issues of humanity and global problems. Some examples of stuff that really struck me-- In Mermaid, everyone is drawn just as outlines (i.e. you can see the backgrounds through them), as if all the world were not quite real. However, when someone wears a uniform, or some "codifying" piece of clothing, these are solid-- as if more real than people. Also, Tezuka's commentary on higher learning/books and it's ability to rob one of true imagination was something I thought insightful, if a bit controversial. In Brokendown Film the use of the film breaking down in the fights between the two cowboys was very funny and inventive. Something I haven't really seen before, and an innovative way to break down the "fourth wall". Me and my wife both repeatedly laughed outloud watching this.[/quote] You just wish we could watch films like that again (in today's digitally-correct world).
Should be of some note, the one billboard you see early in "Jumping" refers to an organization I believe Tezuka used to be in called "ASIFA", the international animators society. I never realized what that was until sometime later finding out about them.
There's probably a lot out there that often don't get talked about commonly that I enjoy watching from the independent scene. The 60's to the 80's had a lot of interesting indie animated shorts I used to see on TV or video that are quite hard to get these days. |
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Hoenheim
 Posts: 44 Location: Santa Barbara, California |
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I just finished Princess Arete, one of my first experimental anime, and I have a question I didn't think deserved it's own thread, so I figured this would be a good place to ask it. What exactly makes Princess Arete experimental? It totaly reminded me of Miyazaki's movies, which I'm pretty sure people wouldn't group with anime such as Cat Soup. Is Princess Arete just not as unique as some of 4°C's other works? It did have some themes I found interesting, and I also liked the use of the cliche' medivial times in a very unique way, but Miyazaki does things similar to this to. Should Miyazaki just be considered experimental (or borderline or something), am I missing something, or as I mentioned before, is this one of 4°C's less-unique works?
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Atenias
 Posts: 6 Location: Amsterdam |
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Hanoka is the only one I can think of.
It's the first flash anime, that they first broadcast on tv. At first it do't look like flash at all, but you can see it by the movements of the mouths and a few other things. I think there will be more other flash-anime in the future. To see what Hanoka looks like: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GX4IdOLmWfg |
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beast
 Posts: 102 Location: High Ground |
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Heh, I pondered over the same questions after watching this Studio 4° C film. Imo, Princess Arete shouldn't be considered experimental. At least I wasn't aware of any experimental devices, neither animation-wise nor directing-wise. At most, there were (or could have been) some underlying philosophical dialogue lines on ethics, but that, combined with a retro approach art/design-wise, and the mild, bland choice of colors, doesn't yet warrant the label "experimental". So I'd go with "less unique works", but I enjoyed this film nevertheless. =)
I wouldn't call Hanoka experimental. I won't go into the length of explaining what actually makes an anime experimental (unusual animation or (non)narrative techniques? unique, avant-garde, artsy, innovative art design?), but, judging by the first episode, Hanoka looks and feels like just another run-of-the-mill anime - only with lower production values. Extensive and obvious use of Flash might be unusual for mainstream Japanese cartoon productions, but there's more to being experimental than just..being a low-budget experiment, at least in the context of this topic. But thanks for the link. |
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Hoenheim
Posts: 44 Location: Santa Barbara, California |
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Ok thanks, that makes sence. I'm juuuust starting to get into experimental anime, so that's why I didn't have anything good to compare Arete to. I'm going to watch Mind Game today though, so I guess I'll be able to compare Arete to that. EDIT: Finsihed Mind Game (which reminded me a lot of Brazil), and it definately seemed more experimental than Princess Arete. Like Brazil though, it seemed to gain its experimentalness mainly near the end. Last edited by Hoenheim on Fri Aug 25, 2006 3:59 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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