Oddball Films and curator Kat Shuchter bring you Stop-Motion Explosion!, a program of mind-blowing stop-motion animation from the 1950s to the 1980s. In a world saturated with CGI, Oddball Films opens the vaults to celebrate when historical, fantastical and anthropomorphic creatures were hand-sculpted and manipulated into “life.” This program features stop-motion heavy-hitters Ray Harryhausen, Art Clokey, Co Hoedeman, Bretislav Pojar, Jane Aaron, and Istvan Imre with tons of new finds and a few all-time favorites. Gumby and the gang make a spectacle of a pair of glasses in Art Clokey's Dopey Nopey (1956). Then Gumby must retrieve a coin from a psychedelic world of fun-house mirrors in Mirrorland (1957). Practical-special effects legend Ray Harryhausen gives us a sweet puppet version of The Story of Rapunzel (1951). Bretislav Pojar's Nightangel (1986), made for the National Film Board of Canada combines stop-motion with breathtaking pinscreen animation to create an ethereal dream world. Another NFB treasure, Co Hoedeman's Oscar-winner The Sand Castle (1977) takes a trip to the beach and creates a magical land of ridiculous sand creatures. Jane Aaron's breathtaking short short Traveling Light (1985) utilizes tiny scraps of paper to simulate sunlight pouring in through a window. In the rarest film of the night, Bill Has A Hundred Faces (1967) Hungarian animator Istvan Imre brings us a delightful romance between two billiard balls. The beloved children's book Corduroy (1984) comes to life in mixed-animation with a living stuffed bear. A hammer, nails and wrenches have a dance party in the George Pal-produced Toolbox Ballet (1971). One caveman evolves with the help of some dino pals in Stanley and the Dinosaurs (1989). Plus more surprises for the early birds! It's a night one million minute movements in the making!
Web: http://oddballfilms.blogspot.com
Featuring:
Mirrorland (B+W, 1956)
A seamless blend of puppet animation and the pinscreen technique is used in this evocative, romantic story by Břetislav Pojar of a man's obsession with a mysterious and benign spirit. When tragedy befalls him, he finds refuge in the love this nightangel has shown him. Winner of the L.A. Film Critics Award.
The Sand Castle (Color, 1977)
Stanley and the Dinosaurs (Color, 1989)
Stanley the caveman lives with his kind in a cave. One day, he decides to befriend a bunch of dinosaurs who help him to build the very first house.
The beloved children's book comes to life with the help of an adorable stop-motion bear who decides to tour the mall in search of the missing button from his overalls. Will he make it back to the toy department in time to be chosen by a little girl for Christmas, or will the slightly-irregular stuffed friend get left behind again?
Traveling Light (Color, 1985)"I definitely do have a passion for light. It’s a very emotional thing. Light is thrilling for me."
- Jane Aaron
An incredibly rare and delightful puppet film from the Hungarian animation house Pannonia Film Studio and Istvan Imre - one of the first Hungarian animators to use puppets. The story begins on a billiard table with two balls in love. When a rival ball aggressively attempts to woo the lady away from her lover, our hero (Bill) retreats "back-stage" and fools his evil rival with a succession of ridiculous outfits and masks. Once free of the competition, Bill seeks out a body for his lady love and the two reunite passionately.
Toolbox Ballet (Color, 1971)
Curator’s Biography
Kat Shuchter is a graduate of UC Berkeley in Film Studies. She is a filmmaker, artist and esoteric film hoarder. She has helped program shows at the PFA, The Nuart and Cinefamily at the Silent Movie Theater and was crowned “Found Footage Queen” of Los Angeles, 2009. She has programmed over 200 shows at Oddball on everything from puberty primers to experimental animation.
About Oddball Films
Oddball films is a stock footage company providing offbeat and unusual film footage for feature films like Milk, documentaries like The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution, Silicon Valley, Kurt Cobain: The Montage of Heck, television programs like Mythbusters, clips for Boing Boing and web projects around the world. Our screenings are almost exclusively drawn from our collection of over 50,000 16mm prints of animation, commercials, educational films, feature films, movie trailers, medical, industrial military, news out-takes and every genre in between. We’re actively working to present rarely screened genres of cinema as well as avant-garde and ethno-cultural documentaries, which expand the boundaries of cinema. Oddball Films is the largest film archive in Northern California and one of the most unusual private collections in the US. We invite you to join us in our weekly offerings of offbeat cinema.
