Tag Archives: stop motion

Ghosts Before Breakfast – Surrealist Short by Hans Richter

by Cimaxion

Richard Metzger at Dangerous Minds posted about this 1927 film by Hans Richter. Considered one of the first examples of surrealist film, it’s a daydream that uses stop-motion animation to make people and objects do totally irrational and impossible things. Richter was a part of the Dada movement in art which rebelled against ordinary life and assumptions, attempting to expose the meaninglessness behind modern life. Out of Dada came the Surrealist movement.  The music for this version is from a new score by Nikolai von Sallwitz.

Thank you Mr. Metzger and Dangerous Minds!

The Fantastic Adventures of Cloudman

by Cimaxion | 1 Comment

Look at this! Will you just trust me and watch this thing all the way through? It’s absolutely brilliant! It mixes techniques like they are child’s play! Stop-motion, hand-drawn, live action super 8, claymation, psychedelic explosions, fireworks exploding from the heads of alien attackers when they die, forest battles, miniature model sets! It’s incredible. It deals with mythical forces at battle. The director, Phoebe Parsons, has enormous talent and filmmaking know-how and is going be making very excellent films well into the future. Look out for this young filmmaker.

So this Cloudman is created when a pilot gets shots down and his blood mixes with a cloud.  That’s the gorgeous opening animation that sets our crazy story rolling.

This film is… well… I love to use a cliché, but it’s mind-bending! Super cool and totally far out!

This is one of my favorite films online I think. Spectacular.

There’s a PhoebeParsons.com.

Interplanetary Revolution – 1924 Soviet Animation

by Cimaxion

Paul Gallagher at Dangerous Minds posted this 1924 Russian propaganda masterpiece. It’s a wild, science fiction, abstract work of art that just keeps pumping out wondrous images, one after the other. I love the ragged edges and mix of photographs, hand-drawn animation and cutouts.

Hansel and Gretel Animated by Ray Harryhausen

by Cimaxion

Ray Harryhausen, the great stop-motion animator of dinosaurs, sea creatures and dancing skeletons made this version of Hansel and Gretel in 1951. The dolls are a bit off-putting if I must be honest about it. But it’s got some great movement and settings.  This is one of a series of films he made for children after World War II.