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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trNsfZd7GOc Opening Speech (1960) - created for the Montreal International Film Festival Wikipedia posted:Norman McLaren was a Scottish Canadian animator, director and producer known for his work for the National Film Board of Canada (NFB). He was a pioneer in a number of areas of animation and filmmaking, including hand-drawn animation, drawn-on-film animation, visual music, abstract film, pixilation and graphical sound.  McLaren was one of those filmmakers that dabbled in literally every type of film you can think of. He got his start making documentary films while at the Glasgow School of Art and later the GPO Film Unit (which also employed Len Lye and Humphrey Jennings, among many others). At the end of the 30s, he briefly emigrated to the United States before settling permanmently in Canada as one of the first artists at the National Film Board (started by his former GPO Film Unit boss John Grierson). From the early 1940s through the 1980s, he produced dozens of incredible films in a multitude of forms. He's probably best known for his drawn-on-film work (like Begone Dull Care and his wartime ads), but also worked with stop-motion, pastels, cut-outs, pixilation (animating actual people) and even did experiments with CGI and pinscreen. Oh, and he also developed techniques of creating synthetic sound and music by drawing directly to 35mm film and photographing special patterns. One of his films even features the synthetic sound as both the audio and visual, created sort of a trippy effect. While this is a little bit of a departure from the usual single film for the month, I've picked a selection of key films by McLaren that would make for a lovely viewing. Even better, most of his work is available for free online either via the NFB Canada YouTube channel or the NFB's website - most in high quality 1080p. If you're interested, McLaren compiled extensive notes on every single one of his films (even a few then-lost) in 1984, which NFB has available in PDF form: http://www3.nfb.ca/archives_mclaren/notech/NT_EN.pdf In chronological order, here's some his most outstanding work: Spook Sport (1939 - directed by Mary Ellen Bute, hand-drawn animation by McLaren) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p1_dhTFJWww Amazing early work from his brief American period. Begone Dull Care (1949 - w. Evelyn Lambart) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0r2COvWPO4Y Painted and scratched abstract images directly on 35mm set to Oscar Peterson Trio. Neighbours (1952) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_aSowDUUaY Satirical look at the idiocy of war, created with pixilation - frame-by-frame animation of actual people. Oscar winner and probably his best-known film. Music by McLaren via his photographed pattern on sound technique. Blinkity Blank (1955) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3YeWgUgPHM Scratched-on-film featuring a mix of traditional music and synthetic sound. A Chairy Tale (1957 - w. Claude Jutra) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSRjRctL8XA What if a chair doesn't want to be sat in anymore? A wonderful bit of pantomime, with clever use of stop-motion, pixilation, and frame blurring. Features music by Ravi Shankar. Canon (1965 - w. Grant Munro) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lxNhUswEO7c Built on the musical theory of a "canon" using stop-motion, cut-outs, and live action loops with optical printing. Music by Eldon Rathburn and McLaren. Pas de deux (1967) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WopqmACy5XI One of the most beautiful films ever made: ballet captured in stark black and white with innovative optical effects highlighting movement. Features a unique musique concrete score by Maurice Blackburn. Synchromy (1971) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmSzc8mBJCM McLaren composed an entire score using his photographed technique, then ran the soundtrack through optical printing to double, triple, and quadrouple the images and tint into color. Trippy! Narcissus (1983) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YN9Iu0z2waI McLaren's last completed film, a live-action pantomime ballet based on the myth of Narcissus. Available for free on the NFB website is Donald McWilliams' feature-length documentary Creative Process: Norman McLaren, which features a lot of interviews and clips. https://www.nfb.ca/film/creative_process_norman_mclaren/ I'd have to say that McLaren is one of my all-time favorite filmmakers and Pas de deux alone is probably my favorite short film of all time. I'm hoping this gets others interested into his work. I'll post more of his work later as I need to upload a few rarer ones from the 30s, including an anti-war, pro-socialism short Hell Unlimited and some of his wartime films. About a decade ago, there was a DVD set of almost his complete films and while NFB has most of his work online, most of his earlier 30s work remains a bit difficult to see. But I'm going to try to get his entire filmography posted in this thread over the weekend.  Fran edit: Letterboxd list of previous Movies of the Month Somebody fucked around with this message at 21:23 on Nov 2, 2019 |
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Nov 2, 2019 02:04
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Hey, I coincidentally watched Begone Dull Care on CC the other day when I had a down moment. Incredibly vibrant, lively and eye-popping. Seems so ahead of its time too. I’ll be watching more very soon.
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Nov 20, 2019 23:43
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