This is a pain of unreasonable proportion.

December 17, 2010 4:08 PM

Visdüm Tooten, a short film by Don Hertzfeldt.

The short is an adaptation of this original comic and I have to say that the end product is far superior than the source material.

It also seems that you can watch Hertzfeldt's movie The Meaning of Life here for free for a limited time.

Previously.

posted by ooga_booga (12 comments total)

This is supposedly the introduction to the clip, when this clip was first shown at film festivals, as mentioned on the Bitter Films website.
posted by filthy light thief at 4:30 PM on December 17, 2010 [1 favorite]

I SEE PREHISTORIC BEASTS is the new MY SPOON IS TOO BIG.
posted by Servo5678 at 4:32 PM on December 17, 2010

Props to him for the enormous amount of clever work that goes into his technique. Real stop anim is hard. I know from experience.

But still, the finished product here is overhyped.
posted by clarknova at 4:59 PM on December 17, 2010

OK, now that you have watched The Meaning of Life you must watch Watching Grass Grow, a film of Don Hertzfeldt making The Meaning of Life, wherein we discover, among other things, that rockin' out is an integral part of the animation process, and that Don Hertzfeldt is kinda cute.
posted by louche mustachio at 5:51 PM on December 17, 2010

ET WAR ALL MADE UP
posted by louche mustachio at 5:57 PM on December 17, 2010

Nothing will ever be the new "My spoon is too big."

'Cause you can't say "I AM A BANANA!" after "I SEE PREHISTORIC BEASTS!"

That just doesn't make any sense at all.
posted by louche mustachio at 5:59 PM on December 17, 2010 [4 favorites]

The frustrating thing about Don Hertzfeldt is that he is so, so awesome that anything less than complete awesomeness can come off as a bit of a comedown.

So...yeah. I was a HUGE fan of the original comic strip. I remember in 2000, my freshman year of college, my friend IMed me a link to that strip. I ignored him because I was doing some work, but then I heard a knock on the door - my friend had come to PERSONALLY INSIST that I check out Temporary Anesthetics. What followed was us discovering that Hertzfeldt was made of wonder and light, and then checking out Rejected on the big screen. I've loved his stuff ever since.

But yeah, this one? It's funny, but he's done better. I'm sure he'll do better again. I think what really worked for his comic strips was that the free associations were pretty rapid fire - as a result this short seems sort of drawn out.

Now that I've typed that all out, I feel like I've just smugly dismissed a great artist's work that I saw for free, so now I am going to eat my General Tso's chicken and pride myself on my superiority.
posted by Sticherbeast at 6:54 PM on December 17, 2010

The flashes when the baby is coming out are amazing, though, so there's that.
posted by Sticherbeast at 6:55 PM on December 17, 2010

I'm laid up recovering from having my wisdom teeth extracted. I'm not sure if this helped or not. Perhaps more Vicodin?
posted by piedmont at 10:25 PM on December 17, 2010

I'm not sure if this helped or not.

I'm getting mine out next month.

No, this did not help.

(I still love you, Don.)
posted by jaynewould at 6:05 AM on December 18, 2010

I haven't seen "The Meaning of Life" until now....amazing. I can't imagine the amount of work that took, even after watching the making of.
posted by beowulf573 at 8:20 AM on December 18, 2010

GAAAAHHHH!!!!

The stitches from my wisdom teeth extraction finally dissolved just a short while ago. I could not watch.
posted by Shusha at 1:35 PM on December 18, 2010