Dallas Film Festival - Animated Shorts

Today, I went to the Dallas Video Festival showings at the Dallas Museum of Art. I saw the Animated Shorts block in the C3 Tech Lab. It was interesting that it was at the DMA because there were some people there solely for the art exhibits and others there for the video festival. All were admirers of art, but were there to enjoy different mediums. Some people were wandering around from theater to theater and others were just watching select films - like me. 

The shorts I watched were "Waiting for Her Sailor," "The Flying House," "Ingrid Pitt: Beyond the Forest," "and/or," "Princesse," "White Out," "Flawed," "Summer Bummer," "Guard Dog Global Jam," and "One Minute Puberty." My feelings about these films varied greatly. Most of them were cute; a couple I was unimpressed by; "and/or" made absolutely no sense to me. There are four films I want to focus on - two that I liked and two that I hated. 

The first one that I liked was "Ingrid Pitt." It was a tale of a girl who managed to escape from a concentration camp with her mother during World War II. It looked like it was animated by an eleven-year-old - because it was. She animated the tale as Ingrid Pitt told it. It was quite an amazing story. Another that I enjoyed was "Flawed." It was a heart-warming little story about how a woman meets a man that she likes, but she is uncomfortable with his profession. She discovers through the course of the story that it is not the profession itself (plastic surgeon), but how it made her feel when she was younger. She was uncomfortable with the size of her nose when she was a kid, and blamed the practice of plastic surgery for creating an unattainable ideal. Through the course of the story, she learns something about herself, he gains a new perspective, and they both grow closer together. 

That being said, there were two films that I was not pleased with. First of all, "One Minute Puberty" was unnecessarily crude. But it was nowhere near as awful as "Princesse." A couple of minutes into this film, I figured out what it was trying to say. I wish that it had stopped there. If it had, I would have been writing about how much I loved it and how touching it was. But no, it had to go into all sorts of awful details. It was incredibly graphic and it disturbed me deeply. I wish that I had been watching it in a normal theater, because then I could have walked out. But the set-up of the room would not allow me to do that without being rude, so I was forced to stay and watch as it got more and more graphic and unsettling. I wish so much that I had never seen that, because I am a thinker, and things like that sneak their way into my thoughts as my mind wanders, and sometimes they make their way into my nightmares. I understand the point that it was trying to make, but it was disturbing without warning. 

Marx Brothers - Monkey Business

Marx Brothers - Monkey Business is a classic comedy. Released in 1931, it is a black and white film. It follows four characters - Groucho, Harpo, Zeppo, and Chico Marx and their antics. The story begins on a cruise ship, on which the four men are stowaways. Once discovered, they spend the remainder of the voyage attempting to elude the sailors seeking to throw them in the brig. During this process, Groucho and Zeppo somehow end up in the employment of a mob boss; Harpo and Chico end up in the employment of the rival mob boss (the daughter of whom Zeppo has fallen in love with). Needless to say, none of them are very good in their employment. More trouble for them ensues when they try to get off of the ship, for which they need passports (which they do not have). Eventually, they make it off the ship.

They next end up at the party for the daughter of the second mob boss. The first mob boss hatches a plan to kidnap the daughter, for which he seeks Groucho's help. When he is successful in kidnapping her, her father is panicked. Therefore, the four brothers go to the barn that she has been taken to in order to rescue her. Well - Zeppo goes to rescue her. The other three just add commentary and sound effects as they watch their brother being beaten up until the girl's father finally arrives and helps him out.

The film is very well made. The humor is of a kind that can be just as appreciated now as it was back then. The characters are not particularly sophisticated, nor is the humor, which adds to the charm of the film. Harpo's character adds an interesting element, as he never speaks; it works really well. There are parts of the film which were obviously filmed in slow motion and then sped up, which are very obvious (such as jabbing someone with a pitchfork). The film technology is not as sophisticated as it is today, but it is still good for its time. The film is so engaging that it is easy to forget that it is black and white. The Marx Brothers really broke the ground on this style of humor. Additionally, there are several instances which were added solely to showcase the musical talents of the brothers.