Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter bring you Formidable Conformity: The System Fights Back, a program of films about man's struggle against the status-quo. With vintage cartoons, industrial films, PSAs and avant-garde breathtakers, this is one night the "system" never saw coming. The laughable Plastics Council sponsored film, How To Infiltrate the Establishment (1960s), seeks to recruit young hip surfers and rockers to the plastics industry by making it look groovy to get a job. Michael Keaton attempts to change employers' minds about hiring the handicapped in a musical-comedy all-star extravaganza A Different Approach (1978). A single butterfly valiantly attempts to bring beauty into the sterile world of a dystopian factory in Jan Habarta's incredible film No. 000173 (1969). There was a time when the concept of female authority was so novel, they needed to prep men with primers so that they could deal with it, like the cartoon I've Got a Woman Boss! (1977). One man goes up against the Hollywood system in the silent low-budget experimental triumph The Life and Death of 9413: a Hollywood Extra (1928). Hipsters must die in Vera Linnecar's British cartoon The Trendsetter (1969). Hippies square-off against the police in a football game in the hilarious documentary (later turned into an Afterschool Special starring Patrick Swayze) The Pigs vs The Freaks (1960s). Polish artist Jan Lenica gives us an animated adaptation of Eugene Ionesco's Rhinoceros (1965). With Eli Wallach in The Dehumanizing City...And Hymie Schultz (1967) for the early birds, the trailer for dystopian classic Logan's Run and other surprises, stick it to the man and get over to Oddball.
How to Infiltrate the Establishment (Color, 1960s)
The Trendsetter (Color, 1969)
Cool British animation from the great Vera Linnecar portrays a little man who is annoyed with the little hipsters who ape and one up his every move. Illustrates how the trendsetters depend on others for their sense of self worth.
The Pigs vs. The Freaks (Color, 1960s)
After several violent clashes between the police and the long-hairs of East Lansing Michigan, one hippy had the novel idea to challenge the police to a friendly football game. 16,000 people showed and The Freaks won, two years in a row. This film documents the third annual game. Will the pigs finally be able to triumph over their long-haired opponents, or will the hippies take the title for a third time? Directed by Jack Epps Jr and Jeffrey Jackson.
Filmmaker and multitalented artist Jan Lenica's checkered career has encompassed excursions into music, architecture, poster-making, costume design, children's book illustration, and all aspects of filmmaking. It is, however, for his animation that he is best known, particularly his collage and "cutout" films, which have their roots in the art of Max Ernst and John Heartfield. The films have influenced the work of Jan Švankmajer and Terry Gilliam. In this clever short, Lenica utilizes cutouts to create a very cool animated version of Eugene Ionesco's absurdist play about the dangers of conformity.
For the Early Birds:
Cut from the darkly comedic feature film, The Tiger Makes Out, (not available on VHS or DVD) starring Eli Wallach and Anne Jackson. Waking up one morning to the all too familiar frustrations and callous impersonality of big city life a mailman decides to fight back. He will be a one man army against complex bureaucratic machinery, anonymous no longer, taken advantage of no further. Nobody knows who he is, or cares. His co-workers superficially acknowledge him, and the citizens whom he serves see him only in terms of his function. The particular day starts off gloriously when the leg of his neighbor’s wife comes crashing through his ceiling, and our hero tries without success to get his landlady to make repairs. He then tackles the Housing Authority, where equally thwarted clerks treat him like a number. But today our hero refuses to be assigned any old place - he wants to be heard, at once! The bureaucracy proves more stubborn than he. Defeated and helpless, one individual lost among many, his angry campaign only led to more frustration.
Now What? (Color, 196?)
Bizarre anti-materialism short produced by the Lutheran church utilizes crude animation mixed with live footage that also clearly illustrates the pop-culture/hippie threat.