Harvie Krumpet

Three words to describe Adam Elliot's (master of clay animation) 22 min and 7 sec film Harvie Krumpet: sardonic and poignant. This Academy Award winning short film follows the title character, a naïve but optimistic Polish who ends up in Australia, and his unlucky life. That is an understatement; he gets struck by lightning, has his testicle removed, is plagued by Tourette's Syndrome, just to name a few. But one single phrase (Carpe diem) causes him to embrace life despite his unfortunate circumstances (hooray for nudist colonies and chickens!). Crafted in both a humorous and distressing manner – you will laugh one moment then sink back into depression out of sympathy for Harvie – and superbly narrated by Geoffrey Rush, this film will make you smile and want to lead a better life. After all, if Harvie Krumpet can do it, you can too.

Harvie Krumpet is one excellent story. Very dark at times but also a reflection of life. As Harvie's life unfolds you can't help but think, yep life is like that. It's very funny, very sad and also very true.

My family sat down tonight to watch Harvie on SBS (Australian TV station) and we all fell in love with Harvie. Our ages ranging from 29 through to 85, we all all found something we could relate to in Harvie. Excellent storytelling, plenty of dark humour and a character you can't but help love.

The story and the humanity we see in Harvie is what makes Harvie Crumpet so appealing. There is also excellent Claymation that adds many dimensions to the characters. The expressions upon the characters faces truly add to the story that is being told. Each character is expressive and unforgettable. An excellent example of great story telling.

Go Harvie!!!!

Harvie Krumpet is a strange little man and life has never been on his side. This film tells his story and takes you on the journey.

The story is very well written and it mix drama and comedy very good. It is very funny, but still serious. The story is unique and original for a short film and it turns out quite good on the screen. The characters are charming and good. You really have sympathy for them and you get to know them. Especially Harvie. The animation is very good. It's stop motion clay animation in the best Nick Park style. It's very impressive. The narration by Geoffrey Rush is very good. I was skeptical when I saw that this film lasted for 20 minutes, but 20 minutes later I wondered where the time went. The film thrilled me and got me hooked and I was never bored. It turned and twisted and kept the audience interested.

All together a very good and very charming little short film about the outsiders in society. A movie well worth to watch.

I saw this when it was coming out. I remember it stroke me as incredibly fresh and imaginative. Part of this might be because i was at quite a different stage in my life through films. But now, 7 years later, this still retains a lot of its appeal. It's not been so long, but this still works on all its purposes, humor and visuals.

The skill in the making of this is top notch in every respect, of course. The characters, and such a film is absolutely all about characters are great in how the specificities of clay are used to convey absolutely every emotional nuance.

The story is a good piece of writing, using the always powerful combination of tragedy and comedy, something Chaplin understood so well. I think we cry deeper when we feel we shouldn't be laughing. It's the contrast that creates the power. By taking you to extremes of fun, enabling you to laugh, and suddenly pulling the rug out of your feet, writers leave you in a state of inner shame, which we interpret with uneasiness. Or it's the simple overlapping of comedy bits over a tragic environment. But i go with the first possibility.

Geoffrey Rush is great as an actor, and he brings that subtlety to his voice over.

But what probably caught my mind and makes this last is the clever framing they use. The "Fakts" as they're spelled in the film. Harvie spends his live registering unusual bizarre views of the world, in little sentences he calls (taught by his mother) fakts. These thoughts mirror what goes on happening to him throughout his life, filtered through Harvie's crippled yet beautiful mind. The fun is in how each fakt never reproduces correctly what really happens, and so it becomes a kind of a comment on the story itself. Born from it, but exterior to it, a separate element, clearly represented by the book Harvie carries strapped around his neck always, even when he's naked. Great stuff.

My opinion: 4/5

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This little Australian claymation production was an unlikely winner for best animated short at the Oscar ceremony for 2003, beating a pixar production and other anime-bigwigs. Which is ironic, because Adam Elliot's twenty minute short is about an underdog. Elliot has appealed to a popular Australian myth, that of the Aussie battler, and the underdog (who we Australians inevitably root for), as a way to make an Australian audience sympathise with a migrant from poland, and recognise a similarity between themselves an him. What makes this short clever is that it uses the form of a children's story, a fairy tale, to communicate a moving story of hardships and not seem to bash the audience over the head with them. It has the appeal of the wonderful Aussie film The Castle, where great profundity can be found through a story told very simply, about simple people, whose outlook on life is so admirable. The story Harvie Crumpet tells, and the character of Harvey, are, of course, very different. Harvie suffers so much, and so many terrible things happen to him, that you have to wonder what is the redeeming thing about this story that makes it worth watching (leaving to the side its marvellous presentation in the guise of a children's fairy tale, or claymation television program perhaps, which creates, as mentioned, a juxtaposition with its content which is effective in lending it a genuine feel, making the audience want to be touched by Harvie). And, of course, the thing that makes Harvie remarkable is that he survives. He doubts himself, like all of us, and at times wants to give up the game, but at the end of the day, he seizes what precious moments he has.

Geoffery Rush as narrator rivals Anthony Hopkins for his fairy tale narration in The Grinch. Reveals what a wonderful, Australian storytelling voice he has. He should do more work in this vein, not to undermine his appearances onscreen, which are also marvellous (particularly Shakespeare in Love and Shine, but like Cate Blanchett, and unlike every other actor in the Hollywood past and present, he is just fantastic in every role).

In just twenty three minutes we are told, with the help of Rush, the life story of Harvie Krumpet - and at the end, even though he's only made of clay, we really feel like we know him. And he's a little fella that stays with you.