Love At First Byte
August 30, 2008 3:17 PM   Subscribe

From darkness, she rose into the light... Meet Ela, young warrior princess! This short uses tacky CG technology to pay homage to our most wicked '80s fantasies. [via]
posted by [NOT HERMITOSIS-IST] (33 comments total) 4 users marked this as a favorite
 
By wicked, do you mean pathetic, masturbatory, and misogynistic?
posted by orthogonality at 3:22 PM on August 30, 2008 [3 favorites]


(Because in that case, sign me up!)
posted by orthogonality at 3:23 PM on August 30, 2008


Yeah, I'd say that about sums up the decade.
posted by [NOT HERMITOSIS-IST] at 3:24 PM on August 30, 2008


Seeing as my most wicked 80s fantasies involved Bringing About The Social Revolution and getting jiggy with David Bowie (pre Let's Dance, please note), I find this all rather confusing.

Lawn, etc.
posted by jokeefe at 3:28 PM on August 30, 2008 [3 favorites]


If not even a little part of you gets excited when she summons the robo-eagle, you may as well just intern yourself under that lawn.
posted by [NOT HERMITOSIS-IST] at 3:32 PM on August 30, 2008


[NOT HERMITOSIS-IST] writes "If not even a little part of you gets excited when she summons the robo-eagle,"

I had a girlfriend who "summoned the robo-eagle," that is, she did until she met me.
posted by orthogonality at 3:35 PM on August 30, 2008 [3 favorites]


What do you mean, "tacky"? I thought that was pretty cool!
posted by Class Goat at 3:49 PM on August 30, 2008


My 80's fantasies did not involve bum hungries.
posted by benzenedream at 3:59 PM on August 30, 2008


Actually I found it kind of dull. Heavy on effects and design, it was really evocative of children's cartoons in the early 80s, but the film itself was just kind of visually confusing, and you feel like you don't even get a clean shot of the main character, she wasn't well integrated with the CG, and so on.
posted by delmoi at 4:14 PM on August 30, 2008


I hope everyone responsible for that "film" has been Gitmo'd.
posted by Mr. President Dr. Steve Elvis America at 4:36 PM on August 30, 2008


you feel like you don't even get a clean shot of the main character, she wasn't well integrated with the CG, and so on.

So much so that it looks like an actual kids' show from the 80's! Are you sure this is an homage and not a lost pilot?
posted by GuyZero at 4:50 PM on August 30, 2008


delmoi writes "you feel like you don't even get a clean shot of the main character,"

But many viewers report getting a clean shot at her.

(Rimshot!)

(No, not that kind of rimshot.)
posted by orthogonality at 5:06 PM on August 30, 2008


The Hitachi Robo-Eagle is such a life-changer for many women, that the employees of our company have chosen to make a living distributing/supporting that one product. (for more info, see the web site in our profile)
posted by UbuRoivas at 5:13 PM on August 30, 2008 [12 favorites]


Nice homage to kitsch.
posted by peppito at 5:57 PM on August 30, 2008


(I guess I never got the knack for being fashionably snide and dismissive.)
posted by Class Goat at 5:58 PM on August 30, 2008


Actually thought the production itself was pretty respectable. Fast editing, not a lot of wasted time, decent pacing, all that. It was ugly as hell, but it wasn't bad.

That being said, I was left with a big WTF floating over my head. When she punched it, I turned the video off. Zap.

Reminded me of some of those Turkish superhero movies that were floating around last year.

This isn't what I was thinking of, but it's so cool it deserves a mention.
posted by Xoebe at 6:08 PM on August 30, 2008 [2 favorites]


Next project, Heavy Metal F.A.P.P.2
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:11 PM on August 30, 2008


I'm not down with the plot, but it definitely breaks new ground as far as the look goes.
posted by BrotherCaine at 6:22 PM on August 30, 2008


our most wicked '80s fantasies

Staying up past nine and drinking pop on a weekday?
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 7:17 PM on August 30, 2008 [2 favorites]


Nice homage to kitsch.

What??

Oh, never mind.
posted by kisch mokusch at 7:31 PM on August 30, 2008


Did you guys watch it till the end? It goes to a really weird and dark place. There are shots that are really beautiful in it. I'm not really sure what I think of it, but the director is undeniably talented.
posted by empath at 9:07 PM on August 30, 2008


I watched to the end; it didn't really work for me. It veered to quickly from sex-comedy gag to a "dark place" for me, but there was plenty of good stuff in there.
posted by grobstein at 9:23 PM on August 30, 2008


Did you guys watch it till the end?

It wouldn't load for me the first time, but yeah, it's well put together. I agree with grobstein, it'd be really good - or at least more engaging for former 'toon deprived kids like me - if they hadn't depended on aesthetic nostalgia and then grim melodrama carrying as much of the narrative weight as they did.

It goes to a really weird and dark place.

Obviously you've never dated a polyhedron.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:02 PM on August 30, 2008


Yeh, that really was a bizarre love cube.
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:10 PM on August 30, 2008


the director is undeniably talented.

maybe, but he needs an editor *badly*. that sequence where she was fighting the space invaders with her sword went on for about five times as long as it should have. i would've fast forwarded if it was possible, but watched away thinking "surely this is leading to something" but nope. nothing doing. compared with the bizarreness of the ending, it's hard not to think he started out making one thing, but a year or more down the track decided to tack something completely different onto the end.
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:16 PM on August 30, 2008


With the power of buttocks as her ally, she will confront the dorkest of creatures... it looks like non-whacking material cleverly disguised as whacking material for guys too young to whack anyway.
posted by pracowity at 11:16 PM on August 30, 2008


It's visually interesting, but it can't seem to decide what source material it's referencing. It alternates jarringly between He-Man: Masters of the Universe-type toy commercial cartoons, the Taarnaa segment from Heavy Metal, and cheap sci-fi/fantasy B-movies. Narrow down the source material some, otherwise it's just more "ha ha the 80s in general", which is overdone.
posted by DecemberBoy at 12:12 AM on August 31, 2008


Those wacky Argentines!

She should've summoned her loyal army of digi-gauchos for her struggle against cubism.
posted by dakotadusk at 3:55 AM on August 31, 2008


It's visually interesting, but it can't seem to decide what source material it's referencing. It alternates jarringly between He-Man: Masters of the Universe-type toy commercial cartoons, the Taarnaa segment from Heavy Metal, and cheap sci-fi/fantasy B-movies.

You mean She-Ra, Never-Ending Story, 2001, Close Encounters of the 3rd kind, and Aliens 4?

My seven year old self kept thinking "Radical!"

I kept thinking "More butt!"

We both agreed it got really lame at the part with the cube and almost fast forwarded past it.

Then, by the end, we were both pissed we didn't.
posted by P.o.B. at 5:08 AM on August 31, 2008


Could. Not. Watch. Too. Lame.

Permanently brain damaged now ...
posted by aldus_manutius at 7:51 AM on August 31, 2008


Make it stop.
posted by kaseijin at 8:59 AM on August 31, 2008


Though Ela's falling in love with a box was progressive for 1982 she's still got nothing on Xena.
posted by hojoki at 10:12 AM on August 31, 2008


Meh. Trying WAY too hard. You can't manufacture dated tacky 80's stuff with full knowledge of what you're doing and expect it not to come out forced. It has to be spontaneously bad.
posted by tehloki at 7:28 PM on September 1, 2008


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