Asides

Are we living in a new golden age of animation?

By August 16, 2012No Comments

01

This is the ques­tion that came to mind while watch­ing the very excel­lent ParaNorman, reviewed here for MSN Movies. 

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No Comments

  • Chris O. says:
    August 16, 2012 at 11:32 am

    Saw your screen­cap and imme­di­ately thought of another:
    http://www.draculas.info/_img/dictionary/nospheratu_16.jpg
    It’s a good ques­tion, though a little iron­ic it comes a day after news that a Henry Selick stop motion film was can­celed by Disney. Nonetheless, I’m anxious to see “ParaNorman” now.
    I’ll also take this moment to say I’d read (in a fun “best films on Instant Netflix” list) “Phantom Museums: The Short Films Of The Quay Brothers” is appar­ently avail­able on the service.

  • rotch says:
    August 16, 2012 at 12:53 pm

    Any thoughts on Jon Brions score Gelnn? I have being listen­ing to it the past couple of days and find it mes­mer­iz­ing. Rumor has it that Brion used John Carpenters own Moog for it.

  • Oliver_C says:
    August 16, 2012 at 2:18 pm

    As long as Hayao Miyazaki, Nick Park and Isao Takahata are alive and anim­at­ing then yes, we’re in a golden age of animation.

  • Brian says:
    August 16, 2012 at 3:59 pm

    I guess it depends on when we think the age begins? Is it with Studio Ghibli’s rise in the 80s? The arrival of Pixar to coin­cide with it? It’s cer­tainly a largely good time to love anim­ated films, though I think the qual­ity ratio has been even for some time; there are merely more of them com­ing out.

  • David Ehrenstein says:
    August 16, 2012 at 5:59 pm

    “Are we liv­ing in a new Golden Age of animation?”
    No.

  • Fernando says:
    August 16, 2012 at 7:54 pm

    Shit, man. I’m con­vinced. Case closed!

  • Zach says:
    August 16, 2012 at 9:27 pm

    “Are we liv­ing in a new Golden Age of animation?”
    No.
    – Thus Spake Ehrenstein.
    Nice review, Glenn. I’m look­ing for­ward to see­ing this one. I’ve yet to sample much of the oft-discussed Eastern Masters of con­tem­por­ary anim­a­tion, but it does seem as though there’s a lot of good stuff com­ing out all over. I’ve always been par­tial to stop-motion in par­tic­u­lar, and it’s heart­en­ing to see that tech­nique doing so well.

  • Bilge Ebiri says:
    August 16, 2012 at 10:04 pm

    Nice review, Glenn. Funny thing: The anim­a­tion struck me as being inter­est­ing mainly because it seemed so old-fashioned – not as anim­a­tion but as effects. Like the fact that the undead walked around like guys in bad B‑movie make-up, straight out of Norman’s favor­ite movies, added to the film’s charm. And yeah, it does get quite power­ful by the end.

  • David Ehrenstein says:
    August 17, 2012 at 7:24 am

    You want the Golden Age of Animation Zach?
    HERE!
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cH6i2Z6mTRE

  • Oliver_C says:
    August 17, 2012 at 9:24 am

    ‘My Neighbor Totoro’ got 11 crit­ics’ votes in the Sight & Sound mega-poll (level with ‘Black Narcissus’ and ‘Only Angels Have Wings’), while both ‘Spirited Away’ and ‘Tale of Tales’ received 8 (the same as ‘Russian Ark’ and ‘La Strada’). Are these the highest-placed animations?

  • Peter Labuza says:
    August 17, 2012 at 10:04 am

    @Oliver_C Pixar’s WALL‑E also placed at 202 with 8 votes, and that was the only one of their films to place.

  • Cindi Yanney says:
    August 17, 2012 at 8:47 pm

    My kids and I loved the movie until, at the end, the older broth­er declared that he was gay. That spoiled the whole movie as that’s all my 14 year old son focused on from that point on. Why did they have to do that? Totally unne­ces­sary and in your face. Shame on them!

  • Joel Gordon says:
    August 17, 2012 at 9:42 pm

    I like Pixar and Ghibli just fine, but what about Walt freak­ing Disney? How did PINOCCHIO get one few­er vote than, say, GUMMO? What good is a once-a-decade consensus-maker if it’s not going to con­firm that PINOCCHIO is one of cinema’s greatest accomplishments?
    Outrage is fun. Now I’m going back to not caring about anything.

  • Chris says:
    August 17, 2012 at 11:38 pm

    Speaking of spoil­ing the whole movie: thanks for that, Cindi, I’m sure every­one already knew the end­ing of the film that was just released yes­ter­day in some ter­rit­or­ies (still a month away here!) and was happy to read about it without pri­or warn­ing. I won’t even begin to probe the psy­cho­logy behind ‘shame on them!’

  • That Fuzzy Bastard says:
    August 18, 2012 at 8:34 am

    Cindi’s 14-year-old finds the exist­ence of gay people way more inter­est­ing than the exist­ence of zom­bies, appar­ently. Something tells me Cindi’s in for a fun ride.

  • JC says:
    August 28, 2012 at 5:53 pm

    Saw this last night. I agree that the anim­a­tion and voice work is first-rate, and I quite enjoyed the score by Jon Brion. But I also felt that 90% of the humour was too tele­graphed, which can be a bit of a prob­lem in a film that’s so stuffed with gags.
    So, basic­ally, it’s a movie that I would­n’t per­suade someone to see, nor dis­suade someone from see­ing. Coraline had a more quietly hyp­not­ic atmo­sphere, and a good deal more emo­tion­al com­plex­ity, by my estimation.