Tulkou

In Tibetan Buddhim a Tulkou (that is the French spelling) is the reincarnation of a master.  The lines of the Dalai Lamas and Panchen Lamas are considered Tulkou lines so perhaps this is where the name of this animated short comes from.  Whether it is or not this short remains fascinating.  An old man, lonely and somewhat bad tempered, pulls a strange creature from the sea.

Man and entity somehow bond but the shape is drawn elsewhere, inexorably.  In order to let his new friend survive, perhaps the old man will have to sacrifice the company he has longed for.  Tulkou was directed by Mohamed Fadera and Sami Guellaï.

Sketchi

Anyone who has ever owned a dog will tell you how much they loved the little critter.  This little girl and her dog, Sketchi, are inseparable but her canine companion is old and it is time for him to go to the dog kennel in the sky.

Yet the little girl has other ideas and goes to drastic lengths to try and revive her pet.

This is a sad and funny animated short by Lily Sun. It is sad without being maudlin and funny without being cruel – which is a difficult job to get right. Wonderful work, Lily!

Three Little Cats

Be warned.  This is sad. Heartbreakingly sad.  A happy cat family is left in mourning when the mother dies.  However, that is just the beginning of a run of misfortune which, in the end, leaves a single survivor.

Trois Petits Chats (as it is known in French!) was co-directed by four students:Benoît Delaunay, Albane Hertault Lacoste, Maïwenn le Borgne and Alexia Provoost who created it as part of their degree studies at Supinfocom.  It won Best Student Short Film - Effets Stars - in France as well as appearing at a number of other festivals.

One Rat Short

This is another beautifully made animated short by Charlex – who should really think about working on something full length if you ask me, as their talents as creative designers are wonderfully put to work in the field of advertising but when they do their own thing as it were, the results are incredible.

Written and directed by Alex Weir, One Rat Short tells the story of a rat who inadvertently stumbles in to a biomedical research lab inhabited by a rather nasty computer with arms and hundreds of other rats, used in behavioural experiments.  Of course, there is one lady rat that particularly catches his eye.

Now hold on a second before you move on – this is no Ratatouille (although I loved that for different reasons).  The rats while anthropomorphised are closer to the real thing – they don’t talk for starters – than we have seen in a lot of other animated works. 

I hope you will find One Rat Short as entertaining and as visually stunning as I did – this really does give other animators the high water mark by which to measure their own endeavours. There is also an ending that will bring a tear to your eye – don’t say you weren’t warned.  Thanks to Charlex for another animated treat.

Paradigm

When parents fall out of love it is never easy for any children born of the relationship.   Often they can feel overwhelmed by what is going on around them. Their powerlessness to control the situation is something they strongly sense and they can sometimes blame themselves for what is essentially out of their control.

Paradigm centers around two such children, Calvin and Lily.  Calvin is the older, pragmatic one. 
As with any paradigm the one presented to the children is interpreted by both (as the scientists, effectively), very differently.  Calvin may be the logical one but Lily at least has an idea how to fix the situation – to build a time machine and put it all right.  Together, the siblings manage to rationalize what their parents are going through.

This short, sweet but ever so slightly melancholy movie was written and directed by Stephen Boyer who elicits very strong performances from his young cast, Blake Hardy and Analise Schoenbaum.

Wolfsong

Are you of a mind to take to a corner and have a quiet little weep but need something to precipitate that lachrymose moment? Then get ready to claim that junction at which your walls meet and when people ask just point to your PC or laptop or mobile device, indicate play should be pressed and spread the tears: there are, after all, four corners in every room.

OK, that may have been a little glib but as someone who, as a child, had to be removed from a cinema when Bambi’s mother bought the farm, Wolfsong really did impact on me. I think it must be some form of protective mechanism whereby I have to make fun of myself for my inclination to weepiness every time an animal dies on film.  Wolfsong did it for me, though: there is even a Lion King sky moment at the end which will do nothing to halt the waterworks, believe me.

Wolfsong, written and directed by CalArts student Toniko Pantoja, is a Bambi in reverse in as much as it is not the mother but the child which has died.  A wolf, desperate for the return of her beloved cub, risks her life in a rescue attempt.  Yet, even though the cub is long since dead, she persists.  Watch and weep, kids, watch and weep.

Bottle

Long distance relationships are hard at the best of time, but for some it is much harder than for others.  This incredibly sweet (but please don't let that put you off) animation by Kirsten Lepore tracks the relationship between two individuals as they attempt to communicate over great distances.

The gap that separates them is not confined to simple geography, however, and should they decide to meet there are obstacles that are perhaps insurmountable in their way.

Quite rightly this animation that tells the story of the love affair between creatures made from sand and ice took first place 2010's Vimeo Awards Community Choice.  It tells a very simple tale but I can only imagine how difficult this must have been to make.  Not only is stop motion work for the very patient, doing it in the controlled environment of a studio is one thing.  Creating it outdoors when the vagaries of time and weather have their say too must have been akin to one of the challenges of Hercules.  Every second of this smart, very human film indicates that it must have very much been a labor of love.

If you would like to see more of Kirsten Lepore's work please visit her Vimeo page or, indeed her own website which has loads of information about her work as well as one of the cutest web site title banners that I have ever seen.

Galileo

Although this is now two years old this strange little parable about perseverance and the strength of friendship by Ghislain Avrillon is still a favorite of ours here at Kuriositas Towers.

In fact we are still scratching our heads (a sight perhaps not worth seeing) as to why we have never featured it before. It certainly counts it hits on Vimeo is the hundreds of thousand.  See what you think of this very visual metaphor.

A young inventor, trapped in his home in the clouds, is determined to create a contraption which will enable him to fly.  He may not succeed but in the end he has, perhaps, something much more precious.

My Eternity

Sometimes we lose people we love – and that can be a time which is difficult to bear because all you can see is an eternity – my eternity – ahead without that person in your life. Yet what can make these periods in our lives easier to tolerate are the memories which those loved ones leave behind.

Here, a family loses a husband and a father. The daughter reflects – and remembers one moment that she shared with her father which could become her eternal and most abiding memory of him. Beautifully made, this short film which combines live action and animation was made by Michael Bauer.

When it gets tough, remember the happy times...

SadBot 4000

If Sundays make you feel a little melancholy, then here is something to cheer you up.  After all, they say that misery loves company.  This is the tale of a sad little bot who has nothing much to do on a rainy day – in some ways he reminds me of me when I was a kid.  Yet you can read something a little darker and more adult if you chose to so – it’s just I prefer not to!

Talking of childhood this also reminds me of the way my grandmother would take the leftovers of one meal and turn it in to something quite new the next day.  So it is with this short movie – SadBot 4000 is the remains of a previous project by filmmaker Eric B Shanks.  I know there isn’t a real cutting room floor anymore but metaphorically that is where this footage would have been had it not been for a case of creative cabin fever as he puts it.  SadBot 4000 was created in three hours.  I know -  I have just gone a little green around the gills too.

The song, just in case you are wonderfing is Holocene from Bon Iver.

Moonboy

I don’t mean to make you cry, but I expect you may have a moist pair of eyes by the end of this.  It tells the tale of a young boy who is a little neglected, in as much as he is left in front of the TV and is exposed, via this modern day Pandora’s box, to everything that the forces of contemporary media can thrust at him.

Little surprise then that he wishes to escape and this charming visual metaphor by Moreframes allows him to do just that. 

Whether you are man or woman, boy or girl there is every chance that you have felt like this child at some point in your life.  Go reach for the moon!

One Rat Short

This is another beautifully made animated short by Charlex – who should really think about working on something full length if you ask me, as their talents as creative designers are wonderfully put to work in the field of advertising but when they do their own thing as it were, the results are incredible.

Written and directed by Alex Weir, One Rat Short tells the story of a rat who inadvertently stumbles in to a biomedical research lab inhabited by a rather nasty computer with arms and hundreds of other rats, used in behavioural experiments.  Of course, there is one lady rat that particularly catches his eye.

Now hold on a second before you move on – this is no Ratatouille (although I loved that for different reasons).  The rats while anthropomorphised are closer to the real thing – they don’t talk for starters – than we have seen in a lot of other animated works. 

I hope you will find One Rat Short as entertaining and as visually stunning as I did – this really does give other animators the high water mark by which to measure their own endeavours. There is also an ending that will bring a tear to your eye – don’t say you weren’t warned.  Thanks to Charlex for another animated treat.

The Windmill Farmer

Sometimes things seem to conspire against you, no matter what you do.  If that is the case then perhaps you can take some heart from this charming animated short film by Joaquin Baldwin.  It is the story of a windmill farmer who carefully prepares his land, plants the seeds and nurtures his new crop.  Yet nature has a sly trick up her sleeve for the farmer.

The short movie was created at the UCLA Animation Workshop. The music (and I am sure you are wondering) is by Nick Fevola.  Like many great ideas, it grew from a small seed.  Baldwin was travelling back from Palm Springs when his partner mentioned that it must have taken them a great deal of time to plant and grow so many windmills.  Something said with ironic humor led to first the title of the piece which was then developed twelve years later in to a storyline and character.

Overall the film took sixteen weeks to put together from primary boards to the final mix.  It comes together beautifully as a heartwarming piece of animation which chooses to tell a simply story simply.  I particularly like the use of silhouette which suits the mood and story very nicely. 

You can see more animated short by Joaquin Baldwin on his Vimeo page or his website.

Space Chimp

Everyone is familiar with the chimps that were used in the space programs of several countries in the fifties and sixties. What would happen if one was sent on an incredibly long journey? What would they return to?

This is what Space Chimp explores. It shows the return to earth of our eponymous hero many decades after he first set out. It was reated as a collaboration between the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Ben Lee and Leo Burnett. There is a definite and clear message about our planet carried by this very short film and you may well find yourself reaching for a hanky by the end. To make it pull at your heart strungs even further it features Ben Lee's track, Song for the Divine Mother of the Universe which celebrates a homecoming. Very cool altogether.