Animated Shorts (Various directors, 2012, 2013) Various Places

Reviewed by Lauren Jackson. Viewed at the Santa Barbara Film Festival, 2013.

Including various artists such as, Isabel Peppard (Butterflies), Mauricio Baiocci (Cicada Princess), Timothy Reckart (Head Over Heels), Emma De Swaef and Marc Roels (Oh…Willy!), leah Shore (Old Man), Michael Cusack (Sleight of Hand), and Jeff Chiba Stearns (Yellow Sticky Notes).

7 shorts 69 min. long. Head over Heels being the first in line, was extremely well made. I enjoyed few other animations such as, Butterflies, Yellow Sticky Notes, and Sleight of Hand, but Head over Heels especially, because of how interesting it was. It is about a elder couple living in the same exact house, only difference, one is only able to live upside down while the other lives upright.

There is no narration, so the acting definitely takes part and requires your attention. The two do not speak, but only exchange expressions and brief hmphs here and there.

At the end do we realize the cutest and most understanding of it all, when they make way into finding out how to connect and be together.

Yellow Sticky Notes, with its title speaking for the short, it is pretty much a bunch of artists coming together with their own little mini drawings and shopping list or whatever kind of list to create this collaboration of drawings. Some making sense, others confusing the hell out of you, and some making you laugh or thinking how cool that was.

In comparison? Two different kinds of creators. Yellow Sticky Notes is basically of drawings on sticky notes. Head Over Heels is a clay creation. Yellow Sticky Notes is hard to keep up with, with all the different stories and drawings put together but not really connecting to each other. Head Over Heels is cute, interesting, confusing at first, but makes sense towards the middle, genius, and they do connect in the end.

Everyone has their own opinion in what they like to see or want to see. No there is nothing like a stupid youtube creation, but these are almost just as good, almost better than being found on youtube. Perhaps found through netflix. Each short is different. Butterflies is a kind of disgusting and creepy looking character creation, but the story line and voice acting sounds nice and goes with today’s living. It is not just narrated, but the characters do also speak. The butterfly looks more like a creepy bug.

With just about 6 shorts, only a few seemed to really catch my interest and liking. Oh…Willy! I believe was the only really weird one. A cloth/cotton looking creation, almost everyone is nude, taking place at a nudist economy, the main character gets lost in the woods after trying to relieve himself in the woods. He falls down a hill, finds bigfoot in a cafe, and becomes best friends with her. Just a weird short..

You may like them all, I just happened to really like two, two of which happened to be the two best film shorts in the animated shorts.