Oncle

Having first seen the other two films in this three-part narration about the writer's strange family, I was disappointed with this one. The writer and director is Adam Elliot.

The other two "Brother" and "Cousin" had humor and tragedy, but more on the humor and lighter side. They may you feel good watching them. This one is much, much darker with little humor, and was depressing. It's almost mean-spirited in its portrayal of old people, which is what his Uncle represents for much of this animated short.

"Uncle" works at his hardware shop. The first time our narrator saw him, he was cleaning his pipe his pipe cleaners and make one into a shape of a spider, and gave it to the young boy. He was impressed. He retired after selling his 1,000,000th nail. All of that is light and fun to hear and see....but after that, we hear about his wife who drinks poison and kills herself. The uncle is showing with his butt half out, peeing on his plants, inviting "religious" people to his house (always a bad thing in the world of films), crushing snails with a brick, having his dog run over and killed, acting senile and then going into a home, etc. etc.

The claymation was excellent, as always, but it didn't make up for the too-unpleasant story.

With a great bit of animation, great writing, and a wonderful narrator, This comes out to be a beautiful piece overall. The gentle pacing and cartoony but flattering character designs allowed this piece much gravitas. At first I questioned whether or not the short should have been in "The Animation Show" but it's writing and fluid stop-motion animation alone carried it well.

Personally I have nothing more to say about this piece and to expect me to be anything but excited to write about this great piece is just plain word greedy.

If only my family in Austrailia could be this interesting.

The Lazy Southerner

This is one of three odd little films made by Adam Benjamin Elliot. The trilogy consists of UNCLE, COUSIN and BROTHER. All three are very similar in style--all with similar claymation, all in black and white and all with very deadpan narration. All three films also are quite funny and very poignant.

UNCLE is about the narrator's uncle, though I have no idea if these remembrances are true or not. Whatever the case may be, the claymation and way of doing the film make it very funny indeed and you can't help but be pulled into the world of the creator. However, while most of it is rather funny, like the other two films, the ending is rather sad and poignant.

Now the claymation quality is just okay, but because the film captivates the viewer so quickly and I found after I saw one I was strongly compelled to seek out the others, then this was a very effective film. One well worth seeing--particularly for lovers of shorts and animation.

If you want to see this or the other two videos, go to http://www.atomfilms.com/ .

Adam Elliot's style and approach to filmmaking is something that I find particularly powerful. His means of telling a story can be both simplistic and complex, riddled with jokes and genuinely impactful ruminations on life, love, death, and various other complicated philosophical and quintessentially human topics. And, although this was his very first film, Elliot really nails every aspect of both his personal stylistic approach to filmmaking and the art of the animated short in general. It's mild humour and heavy drama make 'Uncle' a brief but brilliant work of stop motion animation, and a generally excellent, funny, heartbreaking, and evocative work of art.

Overall, I found this movie to be an enjoyable watch. The animation is not as good as his future projects but, that is to be expected. This is Adam Elliot's first stop motion short film. Regardless, it was fun to see how much hard work was put into this film. Stop Motion is my favorite type of animation because it is so unique. Every year there are only a couple stop motion movies released. Which makes each one an event. Even the short films I find very compelling to watch. If I had to critique this movie it would be it is to much exposition. I would have liked to hear the Uncle talking throughout the short film. Rather, than in one scene. Also, I wish that the Uncle's wife said something. When she dies I feel no sense of loss because I only saw the character, the never heard her voice, and never got to fully understand who she was. I would recommend this film to stop motion fans and Adam Elliot fans.