The Animation List Discussion & Suggestions (Genre Project)

[Michael Kerpan]

I would say that Goro Miyazaki's Poppy Hill is quite a triumph. Definitely my favorite recent Ghibli film -- perhaps because it is so Takahata-ish. (Only seen the Japanese version -- via HK Blu-Ray).

Ghibblies 2 had a number of wonderful segments.

I see Ocean Waves as being part of a sort-of trilogy, along with Whisper of the Heart and Only Yesterday -- studies of young love at various life stages. All have a strong Takahata-ish vibe overall (though Whisper has some overtly Miyazaki and Miyazaki-esque moments too).

I've watched all of Ann of Green Gables 2 or 3 times -- but have not yet made it all the way through Future Boy Conan (a bit too hyperactive and buffoonish at times, in a fashion that occasionally -- and annoyingly -- crops up in Miyazaki's later work). I have yet to see Takahata's 3000 Leagues in Search of Mother (which sounds promising).

[Dansu Dansu Dansu]

I would say that Goro Miyazaki's Poppy Hill is quite a triumph. Definitely my favorite recent Ghibli film -- perhaps because it is so Takahata-ish. (Only seen the Japanese version -- via HK Blu-Ray).

I've watched all of Ann of Green Gables 2 or 3 times -- but have not yet made it all the way through Future Boy Conan (a bit too hyperactive and buffoonish at times, in a fashion that occasionally -- and annoyingly -- crops up in Miyazaki's later work).

I'm thrilled to hear From Up on Poppy Hill is a success. I'm eager for the U.S. release, in spite of the dub.

I agree that some of Miyazaki's humor is occasionally cartoonish, especially in Porco Rosso. Cagliostro and Castle in the Sky have their moments, but it's better incorporated into those films, in my opinion.

Thanks for your recommendations! I'll have to track down Ann of Green Gables, as well as Panda kopanda, which completely slipped my mind while I was preparing for this guide.

Gregory, thanks for posting that Le Guin quote. I didn't know she reacted negatively, though it's not hard to see why. I am surprised to learn that he wasn't written that way in the book, considering he's so purely one-dimensional in the film.

[Michael Kerpan]

The Ghibli Earthsea film (mostly) jumbles together 2 Earthsea books (Farthest Shore and Tehanu) that are very dissimilar in tone, style and content. Farthest Shore, by itself, woul;d have been a great source for a H. Miyazaki film. Tehanu would have been a great source for a Takahata (or top Takahata trainee) film. The hodge-podge mess, handed to Goro, just doesn't cohere.

[matrixschmatrix]

Just saw Castle in the Sky (subbed, with a real print and an audience!) today, and I was absolutely blown away. My first Miyazaki, and hands down the best anime I've ever seen (though the field is admittedly thin at the moment.)

It's movie that's somewhat hard to talk about, since so much of how it works is experiential- it just moves beautifully, particularly in the scenes with the pirate dragonfly ships whizzing about, the camera keeping pace with one, losing it to catch another, flipping around, and snapping to a participant's face, deadly still with concentration or ecstatic with the same joy of movement that we're feeling. Part of why that joy maintains so well is the film's willingness to be still for a while, too, particularly in the garden in Laputa and in the mine with the singing rocks- the film never feels like it's going to dash out from under the viewer, for all the handoffs and switches and leaps and so forth.

Thematically, I felt like the movie's instinct to make an immediate and instinctive shift away from any group that had power- first with the pirates as villains, than the military, than Laputa, with a series of rapid shifts in the first scene with the robot- put me really thoroughly on its side, and helped with the sense that for all the Boy's Own Adventure delight of the movie, it didn't have the sort of protofascist underpinning and worship of force that often hides under those kind of adventures. Then too, it actually gave Sheeta stuff to do, and volition of her own- we're not stuck with a helpless damsel in distress, constantly captured and forced to wait for her rescuer, but an active, alert, and equal player in the movie, taking action against her captors and joining in the adventures. I loved the pirate captain, too, and that there's never a sense that her husband is emasculated by being married to such a dynamic, in-charge woman. The attraction her sons showed towards the pubescent Sheeta was mildly creepy, but it never goes beyond a dumbstruck goofiness, so it's easy enough to move past it.

I was also impressed at how successful the movie's sense of humor was for me- I particularly liked the flex-off between the mining boss and the pirate, but more or less every joke landed, and even minor bits of character business almost always felt either charming or funny, and usually seemed to work as intended. I've often felt out of sync with the expectations of what's going to land when I watch anime- I remember watching the majority of Trigun, and the jokes there seemed generally unfunny in the first place and sledgehammered home with cuts to chibi versions of the characters and giant beads of sweat or rivers of tears in ways that killed whatever sense of humor they might otherwise have had. At the time, I accepted that as just part and parcel with anime (since it came up in a lot of other stuff that my anime loving college roommates subjected me to) and figured it was a cultural difference thing. I'm happy to see that it's at least possible for that not to be the case.

[JonasEB]

I was also impressed at how successful the movie's sense of humor was for me- I particularly liked the flex-off between the mining boss and the pirate, but more or less every joke landed, and even minor bits of character business almost always felt either charming or funny, and usually seemed to work as intended. I've often felt out of sync with the expectations of what's going to land when I watch anime- I remember watching the majority of Trigun, and the jokes there seemed generally unfunny in the first place and sledgehammered home with cuts to chibi versions of the characters and giant beads of sweat or rivers of tears in ways that killed whatever sense of humor they might otherwise have had. At the time, I accepted that as just part and parcel with anime (since it came up in a lot of other stuff that my anime loving college roommates subjected me to) and figured it was a cultural difference thing. I'm happy to see that it's at least possible for that not to be the case.

This brings up a good subject - I think it's most helpful to drop "Anime" and just think of it as Japanese animation. The latter is simply animation of any sort in Japan, as varied as American animation, enjoyed by all sorts of people like any other TV show or movie, while Anime is that Otaku subculture that we outside of Japan adopted and promote as Japanese animation. Hayao Miyazaki despises this idea of "Anime." If I recall correctly, the Japanese use the word anime for all animation (therefore, Tom & Jerry is Anime.)

Recently, just for the heck of it, I watched a Starz/Encore documentary on Japanese animation, made through the western "Anime" lens, and was struck by how truly absurd it is to insist that Afro Samurai and Kiki's Delivery Service are the same thing. Stylistically, they are entirely different from one another. In American animation we would never think of these things as one and the same (other than their shared lineage as animated works, G.I. Joe and The Simpsons and Beauty and the Beast would all be considered completely different) but for some odd reason we do when it comes to Japan.

The work of Studio Ghibli helped me get away from this kind of thinking too. It was a revelation seeing the 8 or 9 film Studio Ghibli tribute on TCM back in January 2006. I'd heard about Miyazaki, that he was in a different class, and by chance happened to spot a notice for the series the day it began. It was a crucial development in my relationship with film and a very welcome relief during a difficult period. I bought everything on DVD immediately afterward.

Jump right in, it's all so good (well, except for Earthsea and The Cat Returns - the latter still a pleasant ride.) Dansu's guides are fine introductions. Definitely try to see some of the pre-Ghibli films too, especially Isao Takahata's - they don't make 'em like Gauche the Cellist anymore (and although this is an animation thread, Takahata's documentary The Story of Yanagawa's Canals is one of his major works and one of the finest documentaries ever made.)

[zedz]

Just saw Castle in the Sky (subbed, with a real print and an audience!) today, and I was absolutely blown away. My first Miyazaki, and hands down the best anime I've ever seen (though the field is admittedly thin at the moment.)

Well then, brace yourself for a lot more greatness where that came from. Excellent as that film is, I don't think it would even make my Ghibli top ten.

[knives]

I agree it's not top ten Ghibli, but I think it's pretty underrated in Miyazaki's catalog. There's a number of generic elements to it that makes it feel like the template a lot of his other films are born out of, but that shouldn't be a negative (in my opinion). Certainly it deserves points for being the one film of his where the presence of a villain doesn't muck things up.

[Michael Kerpan]

There's a number of generic elements to it that makes it feel like the template a lot of his other films are born out of, but that shouldn't be a negative (in my opinion).

Actually Miyazaki himself felt that Laputa was too much a mish-mash of his even earlier work. Lots of things recycled from Future Boy Conan, for example.

[knives]

That's why I said template instead of origin or whatever would fit. If I had to describe the spine of a Miyazaki film the end result would pretty much be Castle in the Sky though perhaps minus the villain.

[matrixschmatrix]

Obviously, I can't speak to the other Miyazaki works, but Castle in the Sky as a thing unto itself doesn't feel like a mishmash- all of the elements within it cohere into an organic whole, more or less. I've always thought that the more important consideration than 'does this borrow from elsewhere' for pretty much anything: if the borrowing is successful, who cares?

[Michael Kerpan]

I've always thought that the more important consideration than 'does this borrow from elsewhere' for pretty much anything: if the borrowing is successful, who cares?

Laputa works only now and then for me -- it _felt_ like a mish-mash even before I had seen Future Boy Conan. However, my recollection is that Miyazaki has said harsher things about the film than I ever have. ;~} (It was made inexpensively enough -- and did well enough -- to keep Studio Ghibli afloat -- which was its main goal).

[zedz]

Obviously, I can't speak to the other Miyazaki works, but Castle in the Sky as a thing unto itself doesn't feel like a mishmash- all of the elements within it cohere into an organic whole, more or less. I've always thought that the more important consideration than 'does this borrow from elsewhere' for pretty much anything: if the borrowing is successful, who cares?

Miyazaki certainly has a gift for making bits and pieces he's borrowed from all over cohere into a plausible world. Takahata's work seems to me to be a lot 'purer' in its inspirations, and this may be a factor in the greater diversity of his films. He'll burrow deep into very different projects, whereas Miyazaki seems to synthesize a whole lot of inspirations (real life experience, historical references, traditional Japanese myth, Western literature, comic books, natural history) into a distinctively 'Miyazakian' world.

[knives]

To bring the point of this project really to the fore I think that is even more true of the animation of each men. You need just a cell if that to tell when something is Miyazaki's work, yet Takahata completely reinvents his visual language with each film on a level almost akin to Oshima's live action experimentations.

[matrixschmatrix]

Well, that might be something interesting to discuss- it's definitely true that some animated movies feel as though they fit broadly into a house style just in the way they look (most of the Disney movies feel this way to me), while others have a really noticeable auteurist stamp- my recommendation, Secret of Kells, and something like Triplets of Belleville both feel very much part of the latter group, which is to me one of the big arguments for including both in my final list (as I almost certainly will.)

I know that Looney Toons are said to have a lot of variation with the director, but I myself haven't been able to see it so much- the character models and the physics seem to be fairly consistent between, like, a Bob Clampett and a Fritz Freleng. Is distinguishing between them something that comes with watching them over and over, or am I just missing obvious markers, or what?

[knives]

Just to give one example vis Looney Tunes just take a look at how McKimson drew characters versus Jones. McKimson tends to have fatter characters with thick outlines in addition to very detailed backgrounds (in fact though I prefer Clampett and Freleng he is clearly Termite Terrace's best animator). Jones though has a thing look to the characters with rough outlines and distinctive facial expressions. Of course a lot of this is dependent even within the cartoons based on who is animating. Back in the Harmon-Ising days for instance you could tell a Freleng scene instantly because of how the characters would walk. Layouts, pretty much the DP work of animation, too are very important to this. Just take a look at Freleng before and after Hawley Pratt. The only ones who didn't seem to depend on the layout artist were Tashlin and McKimson who had insane aesthetics.

[Gregory]

I know that Looney Toons are said to have a lot of variation with the director, but I myself haven't been able to see it so much- the character models and the physics seem to be fairly consistent between, like, a Bob Clampett and a Fritz Freleng. Is distinguishing between them something that comes with watching them over and over, or am I just missing obvious markers, or what?

In addition to watching them over and over, one of the best ways to appreciate what made Clampett's cartoons great is pausing and going frame by frame through some of the best parts to see how the motion worked and what made the drawings so lively and funny.
If you have the Golden Collection Vol. 2* around, watch "The Great Piggy Bank Robbery" with the John Kricfalusi commentary for a great short lesson in what Clampett was doing and how his work related to some other artists' (not only other animators but cartoonists like Milt Gross—though Chester Gould's Dick Tracy is clearly the main reference point in that particular cartoon).

I've got 10 Clampetts on my list that I have to vote for. Both he and Bob McKimson are so enormously underappreciated in relation to Chuck Jones and Tex Avery.

*EDIT: It's also on disc 1 of the Platinum Collection Vol. 1. The Platinum ones are immensely superior to the Golden Collections, which I consider pretty much botched by Warner.

[knives]

I've got 10 Clampetts on my list that I have to vote for. Both he and Bob McKimson are so enormously underappreciated in relation to Chuck Jones and Tex Avery.

You are my new favorite person. I understand why those two have such an enormous stature and don't want to take anything away from them, but McKimson and Clampett regularly performed miracles with their animation. How on his budget McKimson topped Disney on occasion in terms of detail I don't know, but I love that fact. Clampett's just Clampett. Even when he was stealing from radio he did it with such imagination and craft I have to pause shocked at the genius each time. Nobody does that ever.

[matrixschmatrix]

If you've got 10 Clampetts that you're going to vote for, please name them and talk about them! I'd like to have a list that isn't all orphans, and aside from the Duck Amucks of the world I'm worried that shorts are going to be so diverse that without some stumping, nobody will come up with the same ones.

[Gregory]

Okay, I'll see what I can come up with, though sometimes (just like in the John K commentary I mentioned) all one can do is stop and say, Holy shit, look how amazing/weird/funny that was.
I've been a little uncertain about how this list will come out, and whether we have enough participants to produce a list that makes any sense at all. Outside of Studio Ghibli, things have been fairly dead here the past 8 weeks. With genuine interest, I'll repeat my question from last page—what else have people been watching?—and also urge any casual readers of the thread to throw in comments on animated shorts they love to help keep discussion going. There's probably a real danger of votes for shorts getting scattered to the wind no matter what, though. McKimson and several others made so many great things that even if people appreciated them, the votes would probably be split like crazy.

[knives]

The main reason I haven't been commenting much is that I'm using this as an opportunity to watch all of the crap recent animation I could never be arsed to. Dear lord the CGI hellscape is dire. I'll see if I can muster up a 'top ten' from the major Termite directors though in a lot of cases it will feature non-termite work. Like Tashlin's best work for me comes from his Columbia days. I suppose this is also an other good time to push the Image John Hubley sets. Maybe I should also do something for the Fleischer animators like Tendlar and Bowsky.

[Dansu Dansu Dansu]

To answer Gregory's question, my favorite feature-length discovery of this project so far is matrixschmatrix's spotlight title, The Secret of Kells. Not only is the two-dimensional, medieval-influenced art style instantly appealing and relentlessly imaginative, it is also thematically reflected in the narrative, as if the director is creating his own "Book of Kells." The adventure elements in the story emphasize wonder, while violence is strictly treated as a destructive force towards ideas and civilization. I know I'm only scratching the surface of this film, so I'd love to see it discussed in greater detail. Any thoughts?

[Gregory]

Relating to both recent animation and The Secret of Kells:
I've always had a difficult time finding recent animation I like, but have watched just a few from the past 5 years or so for this list.
The good:
Dock Ellis and the LSD No-No on Wholphin Vol. 11. It's about a ball player who pitches a game on a frightening cocktail of LSD and benzedrine. If that's not enough of a recommendation right there, I don't know what is. I read a lot about baseball when I was a kid, but I never heard anything like this story. But everything I was reading was written by people who were there to celebrate and promote the game, and something about "recreational" drug use by ballplayers would have been in poor taste. Telling the story of a role model to young folks up there on the pitchers' mound "high as a Georgia pine" (in his own words) would have been an outrage. So this young animator (James Blagden) lets Dock Ellis recount events as he experienced them. Over a span of five minutes the story comes out, and it tells of a very different reality about these so-called recreational drugs in sports. This film made me want to read the Dock Ellis autobiography, which Publishers Weekly hailed as "nothing special."

The not-so good:
I finally caught up with Ponyo—pretty disappointing overall, as many have said. And not to be a downer but I watched The Secret of Kells with high hopes but was fairly disappointed there as well. The story didn't seem strong—or just was not well told, as in Ponyo—and some the distinct mark of current animation styles in it matched oddly (for me) with the mishmash of Middle Ages styles. I supposed I can almost never get into the two-dimensional look currently in vogue in animation. It usually seems like a hindrance to the attempt to create interesting, lifelike characters. I guess that's what we have CGI effects for nowadays.
One thing I did like about the film was its contrast between the human world and the world of living things and sprits, probably influenced by Miyazaki's elaborations on that premise.

[swo17]

The main thing I like about Ponyo is the score, but that's probably no reason to put it on an animation list. Though that gave me an idea: Best Film Scores List Project?

[Gregory]

How could I even narrow it down to 50 Morricones?

[matrixschmatrix]

 And not to be a downer but I watched The Secret of Kells with high hopes but was fairly disappointed there as well. The story didn't seem strong—or just was not well told, as in Ponyo—and some the distinct mark of current animation styles in it matched oddly (for me) with the mishmash of Middle Ages styles. I supposed I can almost never get into the two-dimensional look currently in vogue in animation. It usually seems like a hindrance to the attempt to create interesting, lifelike characters. I guess that's what we have CGI effects for nowadays.
One thing I did like about the film was its contrast between the human world and the world of living things and sprits, probably influenced by Miyazaki's elaborations on that premise.

Well, obviously I disagree with you strongly about Kells- to me, it's totally thematically coherent, expressing in form and in style both the development of the artist and the immense value of art itself, stressing it as something worth fighting to achieve and something worth preserving at all costs. The style seemed not at all a mishmash- there are obviously a number of different derivations, but they're carefully matched together, with impressionistic nightmare visions for the viking raiders, a somewhat more orderly (though still expressive) style within the castle walls, and a wildness that spills into totally different animation forms when in nature- which are synthesized to create the ordered wildness of the Book of Kells. I really can't imagine seeing a character like Aisling in particular as flat or lifeless, and everyone in the work seemed to have a distinct sense of movement and placement in the world of the film- though I think it got stronger once it got past the more modern-Disney slapstick parts of the opening reel or so.