Computer Animation Arts

Summary: “A magical adventure which features elves, demons and other mythical creatures. Darkness, the personification of evil, plans to disperse eternal night in the land where this story takes place, by killing every unicorn in the world. Although he looks unbeatable, Jack and his friends are disposed to do everything to save the world and princess Lili (who Darkness intends to make his wife) from the hands of this evil monster.” Written by Chris Makrozahopoulos (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089469/plotsummary) Analysis: “ The finished version of the film draws on diverse sources, combining elements of classical European fairytales and Judeo-Christian Myth...However there is a thread of evil running throughout the film which sets it apart from other fairy tales of princesses and heroes and culminates in the final battle between good and evil. The film establishes a balance between the sinister and the sentimental by means of cinematic resources – lighting, sound, set design, montage...

Summary Pioneering special effects and production design are used to create the mysterious Skull Island’s lush jungles and vistas reminiscent of the ones described in Arthur Conan Doyle's The Lost World . King Kong astounded a 1930’s audiences with it’s incredibly lifelike animation of the giant ape, Kong, rampaging - with Fay Wray in-hand - through dense jungles pursued by dinosaurs and later smashing apart the streets of Manhattan. The films iconic final encounter atop the Empire State building is one of cinema’s defining moments. Analysis: Note: O’Brien refers to the films Special effects artists Willis O’Brien “King Kong was a milestone in visual effects history. In this amazing film O’Brien established brilliant methods of combining stop motion animation with live photography. O’Brien’s technical achievements laid the groundwork for furthering of the art of stop motion visuals by his protégé Ray Harryhausen” (Sawicki, 2011:78) Sawicki, M. (2011) Filming the fantastic: A Guid...

Summary: Fritz Lang’s 1927 epic Metropolis established the benchmark or originality, design and scale for science fiction sets which has perhaps yet to be bettered. Met with a negative reception upon release, subsequent restorations and critical re-evaluations have led it to be reclaimed as a masterpiece. With its fusion of grand modernist cityscapes and oppressive industrial working class machinery, Metropolis triumphantly heralded the ability for filmmakers to create entire new worlds. Its influence can still be seen in almost every science fiction film released since. Analysis: “The set design, for instance, runs the gamut from cavernous Christian catacombs to abstract cityscapes in the tradition of the futurist architect Antonio Sant’Elia, from the mystical Tower of Babel to art deco interiors, from abstract moving machine parts at the beginning of the film to the Gothic cathedral at the end” (Isenberg, 2009: 175) “The film reaches back into the mythical past and forward into ...

Compiling them here for anyone who is interested. If you're still struggling to find something to write about for your essay then the 'Related films' and 'Analysis' sections could come in handy. Not all the films listed in the 'Related films' section are suitable but if you cast a critical eye and don't rush in blind, you will be able to find plenty of solid essay material. The Fly (1958) The Fly (1986) La Belle et la Bete The Company of Wolves The Elephant Man Splice Black Swan

Summary: Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan revolves around a New York production of the Tchaikovsky’s ballet Swan Lake that finds two ballerinas’, Nina and Lily competing to play the role of both the White and Black Swan. As Nina begins to lose herself to role she unlocks her darker side to metamorphose into the Black Swan itself. Analysis: “...there was this doppelganger, there was a black swan and a white swan, there was this werewolf story of this metamorphosis, the story of a woman who is by day a swan but at night is a half-swan/half-human—that always got me excited because I got to turn Natalie Portman into some weird creature. And all of the characters in the movie are sort of related to their counterparts in the ballet.” (Aronofsky, 2010) “...ultimately there’s a story here of a woman-child, a child trapped in a woman’s body trying to become a woman, and her sexual liberation is a big part of becoming a woman.” (Aronofsky, 2010) Aronofsky, Darren (2010) [Interview by Drew Taylor, ...

Summary: A Frankenstein-like tale of Oedipal and Electra complexes. Two genetic scientists secretly splice together the genes of a human and those of a number of animals in an attempt to uncover a protein they believe will be the key treating the world’s illnesses. Their experiment works but the quickly aging, locked up Dren becomes uncontrollable. Analysis: “The characters in Splice are named after actors in James Whale’s Bride Of Frankenstein; an indication of the approach writer/director Vincenzo Natali (Cube, Cypher) took to the subject of artificial life. Like Mary Shelley, Natali is concerned with scientific ethics — intensified in the 21st century by corporate sponsorship and demand for profitable products from expensive research — but equally troubled by the unique relationship Frankenstein and the monster may have. Signalled by a mid-film location shift from antiseptic corporate lab to run-down Gothic farm, sci-fi turns to horror as the personal failings of the creators and t...

Summary: American director David Lynch weaves multiple narratives within multiple realities for his tale of two women seeking to unravel the mysteries of a late night car crash. Mulholland Drive drive plays off noir classic Sunset Boulevard with its tale of a murder and intrigue set within the Hollywood film industry. Analysis: “I arrive at the conclusion that Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive offer two different narrations of one and the same story: the story of love facing desire what leads to psychological border crossings. Moreover they show the uncertainty of dream and reality or fact and fiction and the uncovering of contingency. Everything has two sides. The question is not which one is real, but how they belong together.” (Brauckhoff, 2008:13) Brauckhoff, I. (2008) Indentity construction in David Lynch’s Blue Velvet and Mulholland Drive . GRIN Verlag Release: 2001 Director: David Lynch Screenplay by: David Lynch Produced by: Neal Edelstein, Tony Krantz, Michael Polaire, Alain Sa...

Summary: Based on the true story of Joseph Merrick. Dr Frederick Treeves discovers a severely disfigured man at a 19th Century London freak show. He rescues ‘The Elephant Man’ from his brutal captor and begins his rehabilitation. Discovering that beneath his horrible disfigurements lies an articulate and sensitive human being. Analysis: “..in The Elephant Man (1980) and The Straight Story, the mask-faces worn by John Merrick and Rose are not disguises, but disabilities to be borne and overcome...Beginning as ruins, the triumphant emergence of these extraordinary faces as ordinary marks their entrance into the world of competent, meaningful and often highly sentimental communication.” (Sheen, 2004:22) Sheen, E. (2004) The cinema of David Lynch: American dreams, nightmare visions. London:Wallflower Press Release: 1980 Director: David Lynch Screenplay by: Christopher De Vore, Eric Bregren, David Lynch Produced by: Mel Brooks, Jonathan Sanger, Stuart Cornfeld Genre/subgenre: Drama Coun...

Summary: Dom Cobb (DiCaprio) is offered the chance to regain his former life in exchange for attempting an ‘inception’ - the act of planting an idea into the unconsciousness thoughts of a human target. Along with his group of specialized con-men and agents, they attempt to penetrate the levels of the unconscious mind of their target by travelling through various dream states. Analysis: “The film is nearly bewildering in its depiction of life-like dream states, dreams within dreams, and dreams within dreams within dreams. Inception imagines the forces present in a man’s various levels of conscious much like TRON imagined the inner workings of a computer system.” (Ring, 2011:98) Ring, Robert C. (2011) Sci-Fi Movie Freak USA:Krause Publications Release: 2010 Director: Christopher Nolan Screenplay by: Christopher Nolan Produced by: Christopher Nolan, Emma Thomas Genre/subgenre: Science Fiction, Action, Spy Thriller, Heist Country: United States Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levi...

Summary: A warped retelling of the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood. Co-written by novelist Angela Carter and Irish director Neil Jordan, the film takes place within the dreams of a young girl. Told through a number of individual stories, the various characters and creatures create a mystical landscape full of symbolic meaning. The film tackles the theme of burgeoning female sexuality - the onset of adolescence, the end of childhood and the loss of innocence. Analysis: “Carter’s original stories, “The Werewolf,” “The Company of Wolves,” and, to a lesser extent, “Wolf-Alice,” are patched together in the script to explore issues of female sexuality and desire within a patriarchal universe, using images of the wolf and werewolf to represent the power, seduction, and threat of sexuality. Both tales and film thus infuse Charles Perrault’s “Little Red Riding Hood” with psychological depth, Freudian significance, and a heighted sense of erotic menace.” (Haase, 2008:228) Haase, D. (2008) The ...

Summary: A haunting retelling of the fairytale ‘Beauty and the Beast’ directed by French poet and novelist Jean Cocteau. Lost in a forest, a Merchant comes across a mysterious castle. He discovers the owner is a Monster-half-human, half-beast. The Merchants daughter – Belle, gives herself to the Beast in order to save her father’s life. While the literal interpretation of the ‘beauty within’ perhaps stands as the films forefront message. The films imagery and story is open to numerous interpretations. Analysis: “Psychologists have suggested that the motifs of horror in the early part of “Beauty and the Beast” reflect a maiden’s anxiety about heterosexual intimacy, and the tale’s termination of these motifs suggest a re-evaluation of those attitudes when an intimacy that had first seemed disgusting is now desirable. Cocteau’s prolongation of these ghastly motifs in his film precludes such a rapid and easy revision of these attitudes; heterosexual intimacy remains horrific, repulsive,...

Summary: Brilliant scientist Andre Delambre becomes unwittingly fused with a house fly while testing his Matter Teleportation device. Based on a short story written by George Langelaan and drawing comparisons with Kafka’s novella The Metamorphosis. The Fly is one of the earliest examples of the Body Horror genre, where degeneration or transformation of the human body forms the basis of the film's shocks. The film has been parodied continuously and is widely considered a classic of the Science Fiction genre - spawning two sequels and an infamous retelling in 1986. Analysis: “... After Andre’s transformation into the monstrosity he types a message to Helene, in which these words appear. “There are things man should never experiment with.” The film explicitly links Andre’s assumption of the god/scientist role with atomic-age fears...” (Hendershot, 2001:31) “The Fly operates routinely within a sf/horror framework of condemning radical scientific experimentation as transgressive while s...