Later that day I went to the Short, short films and music videos projection. The music video I liked most was “La chambre renversée”, for a song by the French Julien Ribot. Besides liking the song I enjoyed the 2D simplistic animation, which was sometimes just based on black lines over a white background and then some subdued colour was added, probably crayons. I found the colouring especially nice on the fishes and birds. Also, the design of some of these magical creatures reminded me of Hayao Miyazaki’s designs for some of his films, like the kodamas from “Mononoke Hime” or the kaonashi from “Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi” (“Spirited Away”).

On the other hand, though, I think it sometimes made excessive use of the long shots and the parallel camera. Using more varied and playful shots would have made a good contribution to the dreamlike atmosphere of the character’s odyssey.

A very important fact to appreciate in this kind of productions is the interrelation between the music and the video, and the animator took this sensibly into account, for instance, in the moment when the music becomes a bit muted and delicate piano chords dominate the theme. Then the character is made to fall into the sea, so the sounds are hollow and distorted.

I also liked One Eskimo’s music video for “Hometime”, though not quite because of its animation but for the ambience created between the song and the simple, soft colours and characters design.











From the Short, short films I remember I liked “The Weatherman”, by Will Becher, from the UK. It is made with clay animation and shows a weatherman’s life and the mishaps he suffers when his weather machine breaks down. It was enjoyable and nicely backed up with Ennio Morricone’s theme from “My name is Nobody”.