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Thursday, March 25, 2010
From the mayor
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Monday, March 22, 2010
Japanimation
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The 7th Toronto Japanese Short Film Festival brought in a diverse animation program showcasing contemporary Japanese animation that strays from anime and explores different techniques and story structures. The main treat was to watch "La Maison en Petits Cubes" on the big screen. It won the Oscar for best animated short film last year, is beautifully illustrated by Kunio Kato and is totally heart-breaking.
The stop motion work done by Tsuneo Goda (the creator of Domo) is super slick and as detailed as "Wallace and Gromit"'s. The films featuring his fashion-designer cat Komaneko are some of the cutest things I have ever seen. Here's an episode.
And one of the coolest videos in the program was Koichiro Tsujikawa' "Fit Song," a music video dripping with commercial advertising ticks, lyricism and kipple. The rest of the program was equally rich and creative. Can't wait for next year.
Monday, March 15, 2010
Wonderland vs. China
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On the other hand, Last Train Home takes you on a journey you’re not bound to forget anytime soon. Director Lixin Fan follows a couple of migrant workers in China who moved from their rural village to work in sweatshops in the big city, and their attempt to return to their village for the Chinese new year. This chaotic train ride is the largest human migration on Earth and the images that Fan captured over the course of two years are incredibly moving, shocking and beautiful. The movie puts a human price on that pair of Made-in-China jeans. Heartbreaking, thought-provoking and expertly shot.
Labels:
Alice in Wonderland,
Animation,
Documentary
From Paris with love
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Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Killer whales and surfing dolphins
This story about the killer whale in the Star irritated me. SeaWorld came forth to say that the whale who killed his trainer last week thought the trainer's ponytail was a "new toy" and dragged the woman to the bottom of the pool in an attempt to "play" with her. This whale has seen this woman everyday in and out of the water. He knew her, her hair and probably her scent too. I'm not saying that Tilikum committed premeditated murder, but I think he surely snapped under the stress of being a 6-ton horny bull used to having the oceans as his playground being kept in a little pool and forced to perform tricks on schedule for sardines.
Representing the whale as a child-like creature no more intelligent than a domestic dog, SeaWorld gives themselves license to say, "if it wasn't for that pesky ponytail..." sidestepping the big white whale in the room: the fact that sea mammals are highly intelligent creatures, with unique personalities, deep family ties, used to roam the oceans as they wish and should not be kept in captivity. Did we learn nothing from Free Willy The Cove? Keeping whales in captivity is cruel and wrong. If we want to learn more about them, we don't need to go to SeaWorld -- look no further than in nature.
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Photographer Greg Huglin caught these guys riding waves off the coast of South Africa. The fact that dolphins and whales have the mental capacity to "have fun" should make their imprisonment akin to that of a man.
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