Bowlers know we have a nose for Goldbergian complexity. THE WAY THINGS WORK will forever remain our our list of Required Viewing. We also endorse “home-made” and “swede-ing” amongst all nose-wearers. We gave a Golden Honker today to Ivan in Austin for his embrace of all this goodness on 11/9/08.
Not eating your vegetables? Not a member of The Clean Plate Club yet? Better hope the parents don’t pull a page out of the Modern Times guide.
As I said, Rube Goldberg was one of my first favorite cartoonists. He drew these wild machines that were soooo complicated but did simple things.
And his cartoons have inspired one of our favorite short films of all time: THE WAY THINGS GO. Definitely Recommended Viewing.
The Way Things Work have in turn inspired a series of commercials which are pretty darn fun. Here’s one:
And Rube, The Way, and these commercials have inspired a whole slew of wonderful homemade contraptions that all over the internet. But we will look at those later.
NAUSICA OF THE VALLEY OF THE WIND (1992) was the first film of Studio Ghibli (even before they were Studio Ghibili!). It’s got everything in it, from the first seeds of steampunk, robots, a great female youthful heroine, and an environmental message (plus another one of how aggression is often a cry for love…). We’ve watched it numerous times, have the figures, and our very own pet fox-squirrel.
The greatest animation company ever, Studio Ghibli, produced this fantastic movie in 1992. You can tell the makers of OVER THE HEDGE watched it but, boy, does their movie stink in comparison! They missed all of the fun, ideas, and greatness of POM POKO. Being a Racoon was never so much fun — nor was pranking the humans. It’s a great tale of resistance and rebellion. There’s a couple of spooky sequences and you can see the creatures’ private parts, but still we think it’s appropriate for age 6+.
Lee Seong-kang’s MY BEAUTIFUL GIRL MARI (2002) was one of our great film discoveries this year. The animation is beautiful and inventive. It’s the story of a young boy who seems to have everyone around him always leaving him. He seems to find a solution by entering a dream world, where he meets Mari. Seeing it’s set during his summer vacation there’s no better time to watch it than right now. We’d say appropriate for age 7+.
This site could not have been built without the help and insight of Michael Morgenstern. My thanks go out to him.
Help save indie film and give this guy a job in web design or film!
