Book Launch and Screening


The aforementioned Animate book Rethinking Animation, was officially launched last week at the Curzon in tandem with a screening of the shortlisted films for the Animate Award. This was useful for those of us who couldn't get to Brief Encounters this year. The award was for innovative work and it was certainly an exciting selection, thrillingly not limited to CG either. It was quite a boysy bunch of films, all except for Jonas Odell's Never like the first time, in which five people recollect their first sexual experience, the last two stories were extraordinary. It was the second time that I had seen Film Noir by Osbert Parker, the first time was last week when it was broadcast on Channel 4, did it look different? It seemed so. It's a stunning film, every shot is beautiful and the animation flawless, the narrative and pacing didn't quite work for me, I couldn't quite tell what the intention was, though I might watch it again and revise my opinion. I was quite glad to see Empire by Edouard Salier, I loathed his film Flesh, but in seeing Empire I could see how he came to make Flesh and look forward to seeing what's next. Other films shown were Park Football by Grant Orchard, which has been very popular on the internet and no wonder, it's simple and sick. Leviathan by Simon Bogojevic Narath was also shown, it's like watching the actors in a complex video game mutiny, naked, some finished off properly and others, roughly hewn, it's great actually. Have I made it sound terrible?