Enter The Fat Dragon
“Someone like Jean-Luc Godard is for me intellectual counterfeit money when compared to a good kung fu film” – Werner Herzog (Quote cribbed from the always-excellent Kung Fu Fridays)
Somehow I am not able to receive any channels that may be showing the Oscars, which is just as well. J. was nice enough to call me and let me know that the only award I had any real interest in, Best Animated Feature, was given to Wall-E.
There was a big to-do a few weeks back when Kung Fu Panda swept the awards presented by the California animation industry, the Annies. Considering that Wall-E is considered by many film critics as one of the year’s best movies, animated or otherwise, this was a considerable upset.
I believe Kung Fu Panda was the most innovative mainstream animated feature to be released since Toy Story but, outside of animators, very few people would agree. On my first day at work after viewing it, I commiserated with the co-workers who had seen it, and we were amazed at what the Kung Fu Panda team were able to pull off. Stretch and squash is a cornerstone of animation, but it’s so difficult to achieve in computer animation that for most of their films Pixar have used characters with limited pliability, if only to work within the supposed restrictions of the medium. I still remember seeing traditional animator Brad Bird demonstrate to Pixar staff, many of whom had only ever worked within the narrow parameters of computer animation, that with enough effort they could push things even further. With Kung Fu Panda, Dreamworks shattered those barriers and made it look fantastic. It was like the first person to run the four-minute mile. It inspired us to attempt to make the same attempt, despite whatever obstacles the technology placed in front of us.
And I guess that’s why I’m not surprised that Kung Fu Panda won at The Annies. Shame the Academy didn’t agree.
Character design by Nico Marlet.