25 Brilliant Animated Short Movies.
posted on Mar 4, 2008 - View this thread

Shadow play has been a part of human civilization for tens of thousands of years. After its birth in China, it spread to many other geographical areas and cultures, most notably Turkey and Greece. Shadow theatre is seen as a predescesor to cinema; in fact, the earliest existing animated feature is Lotte Reiniger's The Adventures of Prince Achmed (1927). (YouTube has her hand cream ad, "The Secret of the Marquise".) Today, a few regional companies still practice shadow theatre. Animators such as Thanh Nguyen of 300 infamy and Aleksey Budovsky [flash] have taken the influence of Reiniger and shadow theater in their own directions, and film students make their own silhouette movies. Learn about the history of this fascinating craft [flash], or make your own.
posted on Feb 18, 2008 - View this thread

Novel techniques in the making of stop-motion short Madame Tutli-Putli. And the movie itself (alternate link).
posted on Feb 5, 2008 - View this thread

What happens in the shadow, in the grey regions, also interests us – all that is elusive and fugitive, all that can be said in those beautiful half tones, or in whispers, in deep shade.

Here are some short films by Stephen and Timothy, the Brothers Quay.
posted on Feb 3, 2008 - View this thread

Scans from a storybook adaptation of John Sutherland's 1959 animated film Rhapsody of Steel.
posted on Jan 15, 2008 - View this thread

The short films of Floris Kaayk and Sil van der Woerd blend live-action footage and computer animation. Metalosis Maligna. Swim. Duet. Order Electrum.
posted on Dec 22, 2007 - View this thread

Terminus. "After inadvertently offending a strange entity that accosts him on his way to work, a 1970s businessman quickly finds himself in the midst of a bizarre predicament." 205.2 MB Quicktime available here. [Via Neatorama.]
posted on Nov 21, 2007 - View this thread

Josie's Lalaland (embedded QT) is a delicate and ethereal short CG/animation film by Yibi Hu. It is his response to a couple of real world events.
posted on Oct 10, 2007 - View this thread

Out of work? The Shooting Range is hiring. No, not the Firing Range. The Shooting Range.
posted on Sep 27, 2007 - View this thread

The author of this site takes screen-shots from long-pan scenes of classic animation and puts them together to re-create the original larger background images. Much cooler than it sounds, honest. [via MeFi's own kokogiak, sort of]
posted on Aug 10, 2007 - View this thread

Animated shorts and trailers potpourri: Alexei Petrov's shiny 3D Cags, Aleksandr Petrov's jaw-dropping paint-on-glass Моя Любовь (more), Maximov's Wind Along The Coast, Bakhurin's The White, The Black, Géza Toth's Maestro, Blur's A Gentleman's Duel, Alireza Darvish's What If Spring Does Not Come?, Giersz's classic Koń, Dumala's Sciany, a little Sports et Divertissements (to music of Erik Satie), and a nod to Daniil Kharms (previously) in Herzen and Tolstoy.
posted on Aug 3, 2007 - View this thread

Robbery American Style. Robbery French Style. Robbery Italian Style. Classic Soviet animation from Soyuzmultfilm.
posted on Jul 14, 2007 - View this thread

Koichiro Tsujikawa : self-taught surrealist filmmaker. Mostly music videos : Like a Rolling Stone .. Eyes [hi-fi, making of] .. Untitled .. Fit Song.. Breezin' .. Tone Twilight Zone .. Wonder Word .. Gakaxy in the Groove .. I Hate Hate
posted on Jun 11, 2007 - View this thread

Puleng is a lovely and evocative animated short film (about 3 minutes) with a refreshingly simple yet sophisticated visual style. A poignant little portrait of life ended and life renewed.
posted on May 12, 2007 - View this thread

L'inventaire Fantôme - an excellent and creepy animated short film (official site). Liked it? You might also enjoy the charming L'Animateur, not least for its soundtrack. Both found via StopMoShorts.
posted on Apr 16, 2007 - View this thread

Cloned Disney cels: page 1 [Russian, bad English], page 2 [Russian, bad English]
posted on Apr 10, 2007 - View this thread

40 years ago, the Vicious Cycles motorcycle club assaulted a construction worker before taking to the road. Fortunately, filmmakers Chuck Menville (father of voice artist Scott Menville) and Len Janson were on hand to film the gang's misdeeds. Menville and Janson's picture would ultimately become part of a trilogy, with Blaze Glory and Sargent Swell of the Mounties produced wit similar eye-catching style. Decades later, the filmmakers' work would be echoed in another tale of conflict, in addition to a product-themed homage to more recent hipster subculture.
posted on Mar 19, 2007 - View this thread

Ryan Larkin [1943-2007]
posted on Feb 17, 2007 - View this thread

Das Rad ("The Wheel") google video Apparently rocks speak to one another. They just do it very, very slowly. An stop-motion short from Germany with English subtitles. Creators' website.flash
posted on Feb 9, 2007 - View this thread

Harry Everett Smith was a, "20th-century Renaissance man, working as an abstract film-maker, painter, musicologist, anthropologist, theoretician, self-mythologizer and connoisseur of arcana". His Anthology of American Folk Music was hugely influential on American music, while his alchemical, synæsthetic films were to have a similar impact on experimental film and animation. Enjoy his mesmerising and astonishing "Early Abstractions" on Youtube [part 1 or 4], hear Harry lecture, or listen to some tracks from The Anthology.
posted on Dec 8, 2006 - View this thread

Mr. CityMen is a series of five evocative animation/live action Quicktime shorts by Eric Lerner, including Mr. Deja Vu, Mr. Fortune, Mr. Afraid of Anything But Heights, Mr. Sunken and my fave, Mr. Dreamer, bouncing around the beautiful urban decay.
posted on Nov 26, 2006 - View this thread

Idol
posted on Oct 13, 2006 - View this thread

Norman McLaren's Masterpiece with music by Oscar Peterson. Each frame of this short was scratched directly onto the film in order to be in perfect synch with the pre-recorded soundtrack. This has been discussed before here and more generally here but I haven't seen this online until now. More on Norman McLaren.
posted on Sep 6, 2006 - View this thread

"A quoi ça sert l’amour?" (previously) is an adorable cartoon set to a fantastic old song by Edith Piaf; recently, students at USC Film School set out to act out a live version of the cartoon, results here.
posted on Sep 5, 2006 - View this thread

Mona Lisa and other classics in clay animation. Joan C. Gratz is the talented artist behind this and other projects. This particular short film won an academy award for best animated short film in 1992. I am surprised to have never viewed it before today. Wikipedia has next to nothing on Gratz or her works.
posted on Aug 14, 2006 - View this thread

Ishu Patel’s created a number of animated short films. The Bead Game (YouTube), is a brief history of adversaries and energy. The tabla (YouTube) sound track by JP Ghosh.
posted on Aug 5, 2006 - View this thread

50 Animated Shorts from the National Film Board of Canada Focus on Animation. Including René Jodoin, Norman McLaren, Caroline Leaf and more. [streaming quicktime]
posted on Jul 16, 2006 - View this thread

Sometimes movies don't finish the way we'd like. Short, off-beat, animated re-imaginings of selected movie endings, in torrent and .wmv format. The archives are yet young, but might be worth keeping an eye on for future chuckles.
posted on Jan 25, 2006 - View this thread

39 Pounds of Love "is the inspirational and humorous non-fiction account of Ami Ankilewitz, who was diagnosed with an extremely rare and often fatal form of SMA/2 that severely limits his physical growth and movement yet at 34 years of age, he continues to outlive a doctor's prediction of life expectancy by 28 years and counting. Ami, who weighs only 39 pounds, works in Israel as a 3D animator and creates his art despite the fact that his bodily motion is limited to a single finger on his left hand."
posted on Dec 9, 2005 - View this thread

Le Building (quicktime) is a minute-and-a-half film that was used as an opening for the 2005 Annecy International Animated Film Festival. Made by students. Kids today. What can't they do? Making-of movie here. via cartoonbrew
posted on Jun 24, 2005 - View this thread

Balance is an animated short made in West Germany in 1989. I saw it at an animation festival years ago and am now pleased to see that Milk & Cookies has posted a link to a Flash version of it. I hope you enjoy. [7 mins, Flash]
posted on Feb 27, 2005 - View this thread

Ryan, the Best Animated Short for the 2005 Academy Awards, is fully viewable in 3 different video formats through the National Film Board of Canada (along with a preview of the Best Documentary (Short Subject) of Hardwood). The 14 minute piece tackles the life of NFB animator Ryan Larkin, who himself was an Oscar nominee back in the 1960s for the classic Walking until eventually becoming a panhandler. (prior discussion without full film) [cont'd]
posted on Feb 27, 2005 - View this thread

Chicken Little is Disney's first feature length 3d animated movie (without Pixar). Mark Dindal, director of Cat's Don't Dance and Emporer's New Groove, is at the helm. Is there a chance that the sky won't hit them in the face?
posted on Dec 8, 2004 - View this thread

The Warner Bros. Cartoons Filmography And Title Card Gallery has more title cards and coloured rings than you can shake a carrot at. A great resource that goes hand-in-hand with this and this for all your Looney Tunes-related research.
posted on Nov 29, 2004 - View this thread

Since 1994 Claymovie has been producing clay animation movies with kids, adults, teachers, and professionals. Here are some random clips of some of the funnier, unpredictable, unexpected and outrageous moments. Watch the videos and see...you have to click [download movies], then go nuts. The really outrageous ones are at the bottom...try Something in the Taters.
posted on Oct 12, 2004 - View this thread

Oh My Stars-N-Garters! In addition to the Aardman Animations Wallace and Gromit films online here (previously MeFi-ed here), you can also view the Oscar and Academy Award winner Creature Comforts online! One of my all-time fave films. Joy!
posted on Sep 30, 2004 - View this thread

Once upon a time, a little doggy poo lived on the side of a road.
[via The Tofu Hut]
posted on Aug 20, 2004 - View this thread

Ryan is a documentary about Oscar nominee/animator Ryan Larkin, who now panhandles on the streets of Montreal. A preview clip is at the far right of the photo gallery.
posted on Jun 4, 2004 - View this thread

This wonderful life
posted on May 9, 2004 - View this thread

Steamboy is a steam punk anime adventure by Katsuhiro Otomo (of Akira fame). Here's the synopsis. Here's the trailer. Looks hella-impressive. Kinda makes my pants shrink. Anybody else know more info on this?
posted on Apr 24, 2004 - View this thread

The Exorcist in 30 seconds with bunnies. Happy almost Flash Friday.
posted on Mar 25, 2004 - View this thread

Videohelper.com sells music and sound effects to film/video producers. Here's their FAQ. It's the most fun FAQ I've ever read when I wasn't even trying to have fun. Though they are a serious business, their entire site is in this style. I want to work there!
posted on Oct 23, 2003 - View this thread

Pre-cinema devices & diversions - before film, multimedia amusements ranged from zoetropes and magic lantern shows to praxinoscopes and kinetescopes. Whether you're a film buff or a photographer or simply just prone to nostalgia for a day when the world seemed less jaded, you will love this site - take the time to take the tour.
posted on Mar 4, 2003 - View this thread

What is the AniMatrix? A direct-to-video release of 9 animated shorts (comic book style, pure CGI, etc) by 7 directors looks at possible visions of the world pre-Matrix. Looks like it could be an interesting collection.
posted on Sep 5, 2002 - View this thread

Ray Harryhausen brought wonder to my childhood, with the painstaking process of stop-motion animation. In these days of CGI special effects, perhaps a look back to the days of the Hydra and the wondrous skeleton army would not be amiss. There was a real humanity to Harryhausen's creations, as detailed on this nice site. Perhaps even more interesting are the films that never were, like his Baron Munchausen, The Tortoise and the Hare and his vision of War of the Worlds. Also, criticism of Harryhausen. Last link: a chat with Harryhausen.
posted on Aug 11, 2002 - View this thread

waking life is a wonderful film, both for its amazing animation and its uncommon attempt to bring the mind-body problem to the screen. Curiously, I found this film far more engaging than most of the other films I've seen that use the 'false reality' mechanism. Should more films bring their philosophical subject matters directly into question, instead of relegating it to sub-text?
posted on Jul 13, 2002 - View this thread

The next wave in Filmmaking? This summer, the Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences, along with NVIDIA, will hold the world's first Machinima Film Festival on August 17th in Mesquite, Texas.

Machinima is, simply stated, filmmaking within a real-time virtual 3D environment. In an expanded definition, it is the convergence of filmmaking, animation & game development. Machinima is a very cost- & time-efficient way to produce films.
posted on Jul 12, 2002 - View this thread

It's the plot, stupid. USA Today runs their usual insightful commentary about the upcoming release of Lilo and Stitch. It obsesses over the absence of CGI graphics pointing to Atlantis as evidence for the failure of traditional animation to draw box office. Funny me, I thought that Atlantis bombed because of a plot better left in 50s serial format, a cast of sterotypes rather than characters, and no sense of humor beyind dirty French jokes repeated over and over again. And is huge success of Pixar due to their pioneering animation, or their brilliant comic talent? What causes FX myopia anyway? Granted I can understand why fanboys obsess over the wrong things in a movie. Do the studios set it up by trying to hype each new summer release as the next big technical development (while the artistic development gets trumped by Waking Life and Insomnia?)
posted on Jun 18, 2002 - View this thread

Rustboy , a short film about a Pinocchio/Frankenstein-esque robot child almost a year in the making thus far, has up until recently been illustrator Brian Taylor's personal side project. He's been keeping a diary of the process on his site and posting movie clips, storyboard sketches, and descriptions of how he achieves various effects the whole time. Followers of the site recently got the good news that Taylor has received funding to work on Rustboy full-time beginning in April. I've bookmarked it so I can check in every so often and say, "MAN, I wish I could do that!"
posted on Mar 24, 2002 - View this thread

FLASH - O - RAMA!!! The Flashforward Flash film festival finalasts. Hours of fun....
posted on Jun 17, 2001 - View this thread

Great article on "Shrek" & computer animation by Stephanie Zacharek at Salon.com. I don't deny that the form has possibilities, but I've been getting really impatient waiting for the day the guys at the Pixar/Dreamworks sweatshops realize that the really exciting moments in art only come when you leave some gaps for the viewers to close themselves.
posted on May 18, 2001 - View this thread

Mad Cow. Now the bovines are talking back.
posted on Apr 13, 2001 - View this thread

Clerks: The Animated Series is coming to ABC in May (here's a preview in quicktime format). How far will ABC let slacking, smoking, cursing vandals go? Are they gunning for SouthPark? I can't imagine a watered-down version of Clerks being very funny at all, the whole point of Clerks the movie was the absurdity of the dialogue and jokes. Don't get me wrong, I used to be an über Kevin Smith fan, but I just can't imagine enjoying a kid-friendly version of the New Jersey universe.
posted on Mar 7, 2000 - View this thread