Strange Sinema 63: Weirdest Animated Hits! - Thur. April 11 - 8PM


Oddball Films presents Strange Sinema 63: Weirdest Animated Hits! oddities from the Oddball Archives featuring new finds, buried junk, weird smut and miscellaneous moving image mayhem. Tonight’s program is a surreal sampling of the weirdest, most entertaining, and offbeat animated “hits” from the broad range of Strange Sinema programs.  Films include: The Interview (1960), the brilliant Ernest Pintoff beatnik rant, Help My Snowman is Burning Down (1964), Carson Davidson’s surreal short about a man living on a boat dock with only bathroom furnishings (With music by the Gerry Mulligan Quartet); Closed Mondays (1974), Will “California Raisins” Vinton’s breakthrough claymation tour de force; Ersatz (1966), brilliant and funny mid-century Croatian Oscar-winning wonder; Bruno Bozetto’s Italian “psychedelic screwball” wonder Mr. Rossi Buys a Car (1966); Kosmodrome 1999,  kooky Eastern European spoof of everyday space travel,  Hunger (1974), mesmerizing pop art computer animated short, The Calypso Singer (1966), bongo beatin’ beatnik tells the “Day-O” yelling calypso singer to cool it, The Wizard of Speed and Time (1979) Mike Jitlov’s high speed mind-blowing magical short;  Fantasy (1975), San Francisco filmmaker Vince Collins way-out and weird animated psychedelic trip fest, Your Face (1987) one of the most popular short films ever made, this film started the career of famed animator Bill Plympton, Thank You Mask Man (1968) the legendary animated short by satirist Lenny Bruce. Watch Tonto and the Lone Ranger let it all hang out in Bruce’s take on sex and race! Plus! Blame it on the Samba (1948) a mesmerizing Technicolor mix of live action and animation created by Walt D*sney and starring Ethel Smith, the Dinning Sisters and a dizzying array of animated characters.

Date: Thursday, April 11, 2013 at 8:00PM.
Venue: Oddball Films, 275 Capp Street, San Francisco

Admission: $10.00 RSVP Only to: 415-558-8117 or programming@oddballfilm.com
 
Featuring:

The Interview (Color, 1960) dir. Ernest Pintoff
Animated short by the brilliant Ernie Pintoff has square interviewer befuddled by fictional hipster jazz musician Shorty Petterstein (voiced by Henry Jacobs) as the Stan Getz combo blows and riffs “off camera”.  “Like, don’t hang me- I didn’t wanna fall up here in the first place!”


Help, My Snowman’s Burning Down (Color, 1964) 
Academy award-nominated short by Carson Davidson starring Bob Larkin (later in the cult film Putney Swope).  A beatnik lives on a boat dock off Manhattan with only bathroom furnishings.  Stop motion and surreal effects, original music by the Gerry Mulligan Quartet. Recently restored by the Academy Film Archive.

Closed Mondays (Color, 1974) 
This breakthrough film created by Will Vinton (The California Raisins) and Bob Gardiner won an Academy Award in 1975. In an after-hours visit to an art museum, a drunken man encounters the world of modern art. As he wanders through the gallery, paintings and sculptures shift from illusion to reality, an abstract painting explodes with rhythmic movement, a Rousseau jungle releases its captive images, a Dutch scrub woman talks about her plight, and a kinetic sculpture comes briefly and breathtakingly to life. A tour-de-force of clay animation that set the standard for Claymation as an art form.

Ersatz (Substitute) (Color, 1961)
Winner of the Academy Award for best animated short, this beautifully animated mid-century piece is something else!  The first non-US animated short to win the Oscar, this Croatian film by Dusan Vukotic took the States by storm and influenced many artists.  Cute little guy goes to the beach and inflates everything he needs (and doesn’t need), from a raft, to a girl, a shark and so on…

Mr. Rossi Buys A Car (Color,1966)
Italy was not well known as a hotbed of animation in the 60’s, with the exception of Bruno Bozetto’s (Allegro Non Troppo) great series of psychedelic screwball shorts starring the “everyman” Mr. Rossi. Unbelievable ani,ated hijinks with appropriately off kilter soundscore.

Hunger (Color, 1974)
Brilliant, disturbing, landmark early computer animation by Peter Foldes.  Characters morph and cannibalize in this mesmerizing Pop Art short, with a super cool soundtrack by Pierre Brault.  A must see.

Kosmodrome 1999 (Dir. Frantisek Vystreil, Color, 1968)
The year is 1999. Interstellar travel is so commonplace; hordes of commuters shuttle about on rockets as casually as they commute from SF to LA today.

The Calypso Singer (Color, 1966)
Paul Glickman’s animated version of legendary hipster Stan Freberg's parody of Harry Belafonte's top ten hit “Day-O” (The Banana Boat Song). Here a beatnik bongo player berates a Calypso singer for his high decibel delivery. Freeberg was famous for his early rock and roll parodies and went on to win over 20 Clio awards in the field of advertising for his wacky takes on pop culture.  Hilariously weird.

The Wizard of Speed and Time (Color, 1979, Mike Jitlov)
A young man in a green wizard costume runs throughout America at super speed. Along the way, he gives a pretty girl a swift lift to another city, gives golden stars to other women who want a trip themselves and then slips on a banana-peel, and comically crashes into a film stage, which he then brings to life in magical ways.
A mind-blowing short-later extended to a feature length film.

Fantasy (Color, 1975, Vince Collins)
A hallucinatory handmade animated film from San Francisco animation legend Vince Collins evokes his particular brand of surrealist psychedelia. Mind-blowing!

Your Face (1987) This film set the style and started career of famed animator Bill Plympton. One of the most popular short films ever made, it’s still showing all over the world. As a second- rate crooner sings about the beauties of his lover’s face, his own face metamorphosizes into the most surreal shapes and contortions imaginable. The music was written and sung by Maureen McElheron, then slowed to sound like a man’s voice because Plympton was too cheap to hire a male singer. Your Face earned an Academy Award nomination for Best Animated Short in 1988.

Thank You Mask Man (Color, 1968)
Before George Carlin, Richard Pryor and Redd Fox there was Lenny Bruce. This legendary animated short by the infamous comedian and satirist Lenny Bruce is a vivid send up on race, class and sexuality. Watch as Tonto and the Lone Ranger’s let it all hang out. Like crazy man.

Blame it on the Samba (Color, 1948) A unforgettable and mesmerizing Technicolor film mix of live action and animation featuring Ethel Smith, the Dinning Sisters and a dizzying array of animated characters. Produced by Walt D*sney