{animation} – Page 35 – { feuilleton }

Jumping, a film by Osamu Tezuka

Osamu Tezuka is best known as a prolific manga pioneer and the creator of Astro Boy. He also found time to direct several short animations which play with the form a little more than is allowed in big commercial productions. Copyright restrictions have been keeping these away from YouTube but Jumping (1984) is an exception. This is six minutes from the viewpoint of a young girl jumping along a street. A car approaches so she jumps over it. Then she jumps over a hedge, and a house, and… Watch it and see.

Balance, a film by Wolfgang & Christopher Lauenstein

Balance (1989) is a short and wordless animation in which five men stand on a square platform floating in space. When one of the men fishes up a box from the void the additional weight, and the ensuing struggle for possession, causes problems. Watch it here.

The Sandman, a film by Paul Berry

Nothing to do with Neil Gaiman’s Goth dream-master, and not a film for children despite appearances, Paul Berry’s short animation, The Sandman (1991), is based on Der Sandmann by ETA Hoffmann. The less said about its content, the better; watch it to the end. Paul Berry later worked as a puppet animator on feature films including The Nightmare Before Christmas. I didn’t know—and was dismayed to discover—that he died in 2001 at the age of 40.

Slowly Rising

Burgeoning plant life, fungal forms and flights of insects fill the screen in this vivid animation by Hideki Inaba. The music is by Beatsofreen. (Via Full Fathom Five)

Sweet Friday, a film by Keiichi Tanaami

One of a number of strange, short animations made by Tanaami in the 1970s with the assistance of professional animators. IMDB lists 13 of these films but biographical notes for Tanaami refer to others before and after. This one is on YouTube together with a handful of others, or you can see the same films in better quality at Ubuweb.