The Renter

This scratchy animation is mostly worth seeing for the process and skill in how it looks and flows although there is a snippet of a story in here too. Supposedly based off the director's experiences of being cared for by an old woman in an old house, this simple scenario takes on more excessive form in the mind of the young boy at the sore of the film. While he stays he experiences the killing of a chicken to make soup – an event that has a massive impact on him and fragments reality and fantasy. In this the film depicts the images in his head and it has a good flow and invention to it all.

As a story it is too compact and personal – more an experience than a narrative but Carpenter has put it together very well and although the animation style is scratchy and jumpy (such technical words from bob the layman) it still looks good and has plenty of good movement and changes. It is a bit more graphic than it needed to be and maybe could have had a bit more heart in it, but for the animation it is worth a look.

Just watched this Jason Carpenter animated short on Vimeo as linked by Cartoon Brew. Based on his experiences as a child in daycare, Carpenter digitally films his piece in dark colors that have to be seen to believed as he renders a pre-teen boy's experience of living with an elderly woman at a farm house with a male border in tow. I'll stop there and just say that some of the nightmarish images that appear should be fair warning from me that this is definitely not for children. Otherwise, The Renter is quite a uniquely moving experience which perhaps shouldn't be a surprise since this Jason Carpenter is a Cal Arts graduate! It's so great it got an Annie nomination. Okay, I think I've recommended it enough...