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For those who may be too old or too young, SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK was a series of interstitial shorts during the early part of the 1970s, which aired during Saturday morning cartoon blocks on TV. For the even younger viewers, the major network channels actually aired cartoons all Saturday morning. The SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK shorts were educational lessons on various subjects about the U.S. government or grammar. The most famous and successful of the shorts was I’M JUST A BILL.

A little bill chronicles the long and tiring road to becoming a law. Jack Sheldon lends his wonderful New Orleans-twinged voice to The Bill, who is introduced leaning back on the steps of the Senate. With its simple, appealing design work, the look is uncluttered. A great example of less is better than more. Mixing funny dry asides with an unforgettable song, the short is an exemplary example of how to make an educational film that melds information with entertainment. I still remember how a bill is made from watching this short as a kid. Unlike some of the other SCHOOLHOUSE ROCK shorts, the music isn’t hampered by dated trends, so kids can enjoy it equally today as when it was first produced.

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Filmed as a short prequel to the feature, THE DARJEELING LIMITED, Wes Anderson’s HOTEL CHEVALIER peeks into the troubled romance of two characters. Jack Whitman (Jason Schwartzman, RUSHMORE) has exiled himself in a Paris hotel for weeks. He seems depressed. Then he gets a phone call from the one who put him in this state. His former girlfriend (Natalie Portman, PARIS, JE'’TAIME) has found him and wants to drop by. How will Will react to her? How will she treat him?

As a piece on its own, the film is curious at best. It hints at a relationship and its characters, but never gives us concrete answers. Jason desperately wants to make a certain impression and sets the mood to his liking. His ex is rude and flippant about Jason’s feelings. He then counters with some stinging words of his own. Some hints are made to why she has returned.But all of this is done in a low key without theatrics. These two people know each other and know what they want too well to let the other get in their way. In context with DARJEELING, the ending curiously swifts. This short film certainly works better with the feature than alone, adding funny winks to that story. But that doesn’t diminish its quality as a piece on its own.

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Pixar’s latest short film, PRESTO, from director Doug Sweetland, is an ode to classic Warner Bros. and MGM shorts. And it’s as hilarious as some of their best. A cute white bunny is a prop in the act of master magician Presto. The white rabbit longs for a carrot that is just out of his reach. Rushing out on stage, Presto forgets to feed his pet. During his performance he uses two magical hats to pulled the rabbit from one and out the other. However, this time around the bunny has some surprises for Presto on the other side.

What a crowd pleaser this short is. Sweetland times his gags effortlessly with some great animation acting. Making the gags work all the more is their believability within the world of the theater. When Presto pulls random things out of the hat they aren’t really random. Because this is mainly a gag and performance piece, Sweetland keeps jokes flying at the audience, shifting the context and reaction of his gags just enough to make the next bit of physical humor just as funny as the one preceding it. Mixing humor and charm, this is the kind of animated short that many people think of when they think of animated shorts. Playing along with WALL•E, movie fans are getting two of Pixar’s best.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

In 2006, Joanna Quinn’s DREAMS AND DESIRES - FAMILY TIES won top prizes at animation festivals around the world. Many felt it was a shoo-in for an Oscar nomination, but alas, as the Oscars often go in the Best Animated Short category, nothing is certain. It made my honorable mention list as part of the first RFP Overlooked Awards. Some say it’s the thick Welsh accents that did it in with the Yankees, which could be true, because for an untrained ear, it’s hard to decipher at first. However, after seeing the film a few times, I found myself falling in love with it.

The protagonist, full-figured Beryl (Menna Trussler), is a character Quinn has visited two times before in GIRLS NIGHT OUT and BODY BEAUTIFUL. She is an earnest woman whose chief fault is that she tries too hard sometimes. Her new assignment is to film her raunchy relative’s wedding. Seeing the events from Beryl’s point of view, she captures many embarrassing moments, even creating a few with her overzealous attempts at tracking shots and strapping her camera to a dog’s back.

Quinn’s fluid animation is remarkable. The bizarre angles she creates as Beryl moves through the environment are simply amazing. Beryl is a charming character that we sympathize with. She has big goals and wild dreams, but her heart is in the right place. She also has a way of portraying a heavy-set woman honestly with beauty. Quinn returned to Beryl because she didn’t want people to remember her only as the Charmin Bears woman. While the voice work takes some getting use, Beryl is a character worth returning to for continuing adventures and I look forward to more in the future.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

PES is an animator whose style is unforgettable. Using found objects, through stop-motion animation, he creates bizarre concoctions that often defy adequate explanation. His best film, ROOF SEX, shows us what our furniture gets into when we’re not at home to sit on them. In GAME OVER, PES celebrates classic arcade games by cooking up a short made with food and other household items.

Classic videogame fans will recognize CENTIPEDE, FROGGER, ASTEROID, SPACE INVADERS and PAC-MAN. Centipedes made up of blue-frosted cupcakes are blocked by muffins and blasted at by a salt-shaker shooting birthday candles. A toy frog hops across a river of sequins onto watch face lily pads and pretzel stick logs. Beetles replace space invaders as an unseen fighter shields behind leaves, which break apart via hole-punches from the pipe-cleaner laser attack of the approaching insects. In outer space made of black marble, a spaceship with candy corn flames shots BBs at large chunks of rock. Pac-Man is a pizza missing a slice and when he comes upon a pretzel… it’s a pretzel. With that you understand what to expect visually and will find that the collision of seeming randomness is inspired. The homage to these Atari-era games is not only captured in the sound, but also in the movement. It’s the attention to detail that makes the film so fun, bringing back fond memories of sore thumbs.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

Chris Harding’s brilliant LEARN SELF DEFENSE is a timeless satire that skewers violence in the form of a 1950s educational video. George is an ordinary family man — just like you and me. Then one night on his way home from the bar, he is attacked by three CLOCKWORK ORANGE-like thugs in a dark alley. The narrator informs us that George must learn self-defense so this will never happen again. So George trains with a burly bloke in the ring, following five helpful tips — diplomacy, planning, faith, technology and preemption.

In diplomacy, we learn that you can insult your opponent and if they’re not with you yet then they are against you. In planning, we learn that you must form a plan and stick to it no matter what, because to rethink it makes you a wimp. In faith, we learn that wrong + wrong = wrong, but wrong + wrong + God = right. In technology, we learn that 21st Century weapons allow us to fight from a comfortable distance. In preemption, we learn what to do when we are unsure whether we are in danger or not.

The flat UPA-style design fits with the LEAVE IT TO BEAVER-frankness of the deep-voiced narrator wonderfully. Though the satire of the current war in Iraq is apparent, the film works equally well for past wars and American morals in general. Harding’s sense for the entire package from design to acting to timing is impeccable. He also has the guts to be shocking, but not in a gratuitous fashion. A satire is truly brilliant when it plays truths in a way that make them seem embarrassing in the end. LEARN SELF DEFENSE is as powerful a statement on war as DR. STRANGELOVE… and just as funny.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

Directed by Francois Caffiaux, Noel Romain, and Thomas Salas, this CG-animated student film brims with gags, creating a rare Looney Tunes-style CG film that works. A red uniformed samurai climbs the steep cliff of a very small island. From a nearby island his fellow samurai cheer him on, until a blue uniformed samurai pops up behind him and pushes him to the water below. This begins the tit for tat attempts by the two opposing forces to claim the middle island for their own.

The directing trio develops their gags well, keeping them flying at the audience and building continuing gags effectively. As the dueling clans’ leaders become increasingly angered by their inability to take the two-person wide island, the conclusion builds to an ironic comeuppance for the warmongers. One should also watch the backgrounds for some subtle jokes as well. So many times I’ve seen very cartoony-like action in CG look stilted. The reason is often that the timing and performance is off, having little to do with the technique. The filmmakers have the talent to pace their comedy, deftly varying and layering their gags. Their solid direction of the action is evident. Additionally, for a student film, the CG design work is slick. Calling this film a student film is a bit of a misnomer, because Caffiaux, Romain, and Salas establish themselves as pros with this production.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

Stuttgart, Germany-based filmmaker Daniel Nocke crafts an animated reality show, seen peeking into a confrontation between four roommates. Only thing is that the foursome is a wildebeest, rhino, hippo and crocodile. Helen the wildebeest, Roger the rhino and Armin the hippo wait for the late Gerold the crocodile. The trio have lost their patience with Gerold whose food left in the kitchen may be upsetting to Helen.

The juxtaposition of a common human experience with animals is very common in animation. Aardman’s CREATURE COMFORTS and Matthew Walker’s JOHN AND KAREN are two excellent examples of the great irony that can be created. NO ROOM FOR GEROLD has some of the nice irony of those films, but for the most part the tension between the characters is closer to a well-done sitcom. The CG design is intricate from the details of the room to the smash zooms and blurry pans that perfectly simulate a handheld style. However, the character animation could have been more fluid, which would have brought more vitality to the material. As it is, the characters often seem like humans wearing oversized animal masks. But despite its flaws, the character dynamics work and the idea contains enough humorous irony to make the short very entertaining.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

The more I see this short, the less it works. The satire of the war between 2D hand-drawn animation and 3D computer generated animation creates its world and characters as single multicolored lines. Bob is running late to pick up Diane for their movie date. Diane jdoesn’t want to see any films that have spaceships, aliens, hillbillies, chainsaw killers, gators or ghosts. Bob reassures her that they’re going to see the latest 2D cartoon with a subtitles of “An Adventure in Ma$$ Merchandi$ing.” After the movie, Bob and Diane go up to lookout point and their worst nightmares come true.

The design joke is very funny at the start and has flares throughout, but wears out its effectiveness, because it turns out to be the punchline for the entire film. Director Mike Grimshaw actually says very little about the 2D/3D animation debate. The brilliant stroke of the design makes the story seem weightier, but once the novelty wears off there isn’t much left. The second half is a satire of genre conventions, having very little to do with animation. It’s a shame because the design works so well. Grimshaw gets some nice laughs from the two bouncing circles that float in front of Diane’s chest especially. But this is a case where style cannot create substance when the underlying story doesn’t match up with the style’s theme.

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This short is featured on the Animation Show Vol. 3 DVD.

Guilherme Marcondes’ experimental electronica-infused animated short mixes 2D computer animation with bunraku-style puppetry. From an amusement park on the edge of Sao Paulo, Brazil, a giant tiger emerges, controlled clearly by three shadowed puppeteers. As the striped beast stomps through the streets he creates a magical kind of chaos, transforming the humans into animals and spreading electrified vines and flowers across the modern landscape.

This ode to returning to nature has some fun with the transformations of its mindless humans. An office worker snaps into a slug. A family horking down dinner morphs into monkeys. A group of clubbers sprout feathers, becoming squawking toucans. Other inhabitants of the city are transformed as well. Cars snarled in traffic turn to slugs and a swipe with its paw at a helicopter bursts forth a flurry of birds. Marcondes mixes styles well, utilizing the tiger puppet — an older storytelling tool — as the transforming impetus in the modern world, which is animated through more high-tech means. Inspired by a poem from William Blake, the power of the beast is carried over into the short. While Blake wonders what kind of God would create the fearsome tiger, Marcondes’ film wonders what force would allow the creation of urban sprawl.

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